


Paint the Town Green

by vicariously kingly (pelted)



Series: Pinkerton AU [1]
Category: Red Dead Redemption
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, D/s elements and other kinky stuff in ch 7, F/M, Full Game Spoilers, Implied animal abuse, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Multi, Pinkerton!Arthur au, full-blown fix it felix fic, in which arthur was abandoned pre-game and contemplates revenge, including masochism and asphyxiation, so much hurt/comfort it'll hurt even more
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2018-12-23
Packaged: 2019-09-14 19:40:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 64,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16919169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pelted/pseuds/vicariously%20kingly
Summary: “Well, lookie here. Goddamn John Marston.”“Notyouagain.”“Don’t you worry.” Light and the uninspired view of the far reaches of Gaptooth Ridge reappeared as Morgan cut the hood away from his head, pulling it off with a flourish he clearly felt and John absolutely resented. To the side, John saw Morgan’s coonhound sniffing around, its job in tracking him done. “After I deliver you to Mr. Milton, god willing, we’ll never have to see each other again.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this started as a fanciful "what if Arthur and John play a long ridiculous game of real life cops and robbers but also things go better for it" that was supposed to be short & silly, but then in classic fic form it grew a mind of its own and now is holding me ransom until it's complete.
> 
> so I guess! enjoy! I promise a happy ending...... but the fic takes a lot of turns before getting there. please mind the warnings (which are subject to change as the fic is completed).
> 
> also, please mind that there are **full game spoilers** in this, including for Stranger side missions.

“Well, lookie here. Goddamn John Marston.”

“Not _you_ again.”

“Don’t you worry.” Light and the uninspired view of the far reaches of Gaptooth Ridge reappeared as Morgan cut the hood away from his head, pulling it off with a flourish he clearly felt and John absolutely resented. Morgan gave him a mean smile as he blinked his watering eyes back to working in sunlight unfiltered by burlap. To the side, John saw Morgan’s coonhound sniffing around, its job in tracking him done and interest in the proceedings gone with the fighting stopped. “After I deliver you to Mr. Milton, god willing, we’ll never have to see each other again.”

As he’d needed to for the past day and a half of having the disgusting hood over his head, he turned and spat. That it helped curl Morgan’s lip and make a point for his disgust of the Pinkerton besides was just a bonus.

He sniffed loudly and wetly afterwards, too, just to make Morgan roll his eyes. Which, he did, with a bemused, _still a petulant child, I see_ look on his face. 

Hah. 

John might’ve been the one sitting hogtied in the desert dust and forced to deal with the fact that a damned Pinkerton rescued him from del Lobos, but he could still be one big pain in the ass.

He said, “Not having to see your ugly mug again? Won’t be soon enough.”

“Finally. Something we can both agree on.” 

Securing in his satchel the last of whatever half-decent loot he’d pulled from the three dead outlaws who’d done a very poor job of defending their supposedly important catch, Morgan straightened up and whistled for his horse. 

“So you rob from the dead as well as the living?” John asked, because, as Miss Grimshaw put it, he hadn’t the sense God gave geese.

“He ain’t gonna be using it, now, is he?” Morgan gave him a dark, considering look, like a butcher sizing up how to best cut a hog. “Be mindful, boy, or I’ll start wondering what you can get on without, too.”

John thought about heckling him further, especially as he was supposed to be the law-abiding one, but he’d done that the last time Morgan had roped him and stolen his billfold and pocket watch before slinging him over the back of his horse. It hadn’t discouraged him then, and had in fact prompted disparaging comments about John’s lack of cash.

 _What thief only keeps nine dollars on him?_ He’d been asked.

 _What lawman steals from a thief?_ John’d replied, feeling like the whole conversation was a bit surreal. Bounty hunters pilfered the pockets of their marks all the time, sure. Hell, John did that, sometimes, when he decided to play deputy and take a bounty. 

But Morgan was no simple bounty hunter, even if he sometimes acted like it. Given his reputation among the Agency and the unfortunates caught up in its _enforcement_ , John had been most surprised at being taken alive.

He’d escaped that first time not because of Morgan’s mistake, but because of the feller he’d handed John off to. Fucker had underestimated his ability to rile a guard into taking a swing at him-- and then the guard had underestimated his ability to get ahold of his gun, even while shackled.

That fucker was probably long gone from the Agency. The Pinkertons cared about as much for their people as the O’Driscolls theirs.

Dust in its wake, the golden cream of Morgan’s horse trotted up to the shack. He was a big beast with startling blue eyes and a nasty temper. John’d know -- the thing had bit him on their first meeting.

Morgan had no such fears. He patted along its neck with quiet praise. The coonhound, having pricked up its ears at the whistle, trotted over too and did its level best to steal attention.

Morgan indulged it, leaning down to scratch its ears.

John thought about telling him to _hurry it up_ already. Wondered, too, if Morgan were in the hitting mood, and just how strong a punch he was willing to take if it meant not having to watch the feller fawn over his animals.

Before the scale tipped too much into _worth it_ , Morgan straightened up and moved over to grab John by the back of his shirt and, in one smooth motion, haul him over his shoulder. 

Indignation at being manhandled like a potato sack inspired a kick of adrenaline through his water-parched and food-starved self. Struggling, John snarled at him to put him down.

Morgan obliged him by putting him over the back of his horse, which shifted unhappily at the extra weight. Not wanting to fall off and be stepped on, John limited himself to a baleful glare.

Unfortunately, Morgan missed it entirely as he saddled up. He told his dog - Copper, apparently - to follow, and nudged his horse, Buell, to finally get a move on.

As they started down the narrow canyon path from top to ravine, he said, “I feel it right for me to caution you that today, Johnny, your luck’s gone dry.”

“How kind of you, Morgan, seeing as you’re the only one of us that keeps saying I’ve got any luck at all.”

“Only way to explain you and yours getting away as long as you have.”

“Other folk call that skill. And smarts.”

“Anybody who’s run into you knows it ain’t all that.”

“Whatever you want to think, go ahead. Far be it for me to convince you otherwise.”

Morgan ignored his patronizing tone. 

Not in a hitting mood, then. Good to know. For all his bravado on the ground, once slung on the back of a horse and having to contend with how difficult it could get to breathe if he laid wrong, he didn’t much want to add to the bruises he’d already gotten. Besides, he had an escape plan to focus on, and part of the plan included not getting too much of the Pinkerton’s attention.

When the silence stretched on too long for him to feel alright about it, John gathered himself, raised his head, and asked, “How far are you taking me? We’re a ways from the gorgeous, shining cesspit you call civilization.”

Morgan hummed. Ill-suited though the notion of a Pinkerton being fine outside of some bustling city-center was, he didn’t seem so concerned about being out in as wild an area as the West had left. “We’ve a long ride. Feel free to make yourself comfortable.”

“What, not dropping me at Tumbleweed and letting some other poor bastard deal with me?”

“Last time I left you to somebody else, you slipped off and made me start this whole tedious process over again.”

“Excuse me for not going quietly to the noose.”

“That ain’t where you’re going, Johnny.” John dropped his head, neck too tired to keep straining upright for no better reason than it made him feel a little more dignified. “They’re wanting you for questioning on that leader of yours.”

The leader that would find him. The gang that would come for him. The group that had to already be so, as the Del Lobos had been big on saying they knew who he ran with and wanted a trade. There couldn’t be a trade without letting the other party know who was on the exchange block.

(What Javier had done to them or in Mexico to be so infamous, John didn’t want to know.)

If he could’ve, he would’ve gotten comfortable. Just to make a point about Morgan not being so threatening.

“I won’t say a word,” he told him, because it was only polite to let him know the truth.

To his surprise, Morgan said, “I know you won’t. You’re low, but you aren’t that low. Still. Boss wants to make sure I’m right.”

The reached the base of the canyon. Morgan kicked his horse faster. Copper ran right alongside them looking happy as anything, the dog’s tongue lolling out the side of its mouth.

“He don’t trust you?” John asked, not thinking anything of it. Just talking to talk. Talking to take his mind off how loose he’d been working the ropes over the last day and a half, and how Morgan hadn’t thought to check, assuming him staying in them meant they were holding. “Think you do poor work? Even for a Pinkerton, you are mighty loose on the law.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you weren’t much different from me. ‘Cept, I do know better. Least I have the goddamn self-worth not to be some rich tyrant’s lap dog--”

Morgan, who was not in a hitting mood, half-turned and struck him across the cheek. Iron burst in his mouth, a scabbed cut reopening as his jaw rattled in his head.

When John spat, he spat red.

But, that was fine. 

“What’s wrong, Morgan? Was it something I said?” He asked, and was proud his voice had only gone a little breathless.

“There ain’t much difference between me and you, Marston. Even less between my boss and yours.” 

So, yes. He’d hit a nerve. Quietly, John filed that away. At the same time, with Morgan hunched forward over his horse and spurring the creature even faster, John jerked one of his hands free of his bindings. 

Not noticing his unwilling passenger’s squirming, Morgan kept at his ranting. 

“Your precious Dutch ain’t coming for you. He’ll never come for you. The only reason you escaped last time was because some lazy fool screwed up.”

“And you’re no fool? Is that a joke?”

“I might not be so learned or straight-laced as most in my profession, but you don’t gotta be educated to know how to bring in scum.”

“Fascinating,” John drawled, “how funny you are without even knowing it.”

Then he had one arm under him ready to push him off, and one arm reaching out for Morgan’s gun, sitting so easy and open and ripe for the picking as it was on his hip. 

The dog started barking, the horse whinnying at the abrupt shifting of weight.

John got the revolver before Morgan had time to react. Got himself off the galloping horse, too, though he fell hard on his side and rolled a decent distance as his feet were not, in fact, free of the ropes. Privately, he was just happy he hadn’t split his head on a rock.

The second he could orientate himself enough, he aimed at the sky and pulled the revolver’s trigger.

Morgan had yanked his horse to a stop and wheeled it around. To be fair to him, Buell was a fine steed.

Still, it took a horse made of iron to not rear when a shot went off so close, so sudden, and so near.

Morgan swore as he fell from his saddle. The dog got in his way, howling, leaping and bounding around its fallen master with sincere, inconveniently timed concern.

Cussing under his breath as he was fool enough to aim the revolver at the thickest part of the rope around his ankles and take a shot there, too, John - when he didn’t just lose a foot - scrambled to his feet and began his on-foot escape. His body made it clear he’d have some answering to do once he had the time to get his bearings, but fortunately, it shelved its complaints until he got himself clear of being recaptured.

The revolver had four bullets left.

He shot two at Morgan, who predictably gave pursuit with snarled threats of, _I’ll take your legs when I catch you again!_ Both bullets missed their intended target -- his stomach -- but one struck him high in the leg and sent him sprawling to the ground. 

Confident he wouldn’t be following at any pace John needed to worry about so long as John took to terrain his horse wouldn’t easily follow, John kept the other two bullets, yelled a, “Thanks for the gun, partner!” and bolted in the vague direction of Gaptooth Ridge’s closed mines. The Del Lobos had opened the tunnels again and allegedly happened upon precious gemstones, which had been why Dutch had sent him so far as West Elizabeth. As John found out before he’d been captured, there weren’t any gemstones, but there were long forgotten underground exits that opened up as far as Mercer Station. 

He’d get there, catch a train, and make it back to the gang before Morgan would be well enough to climb out of bed again. If he even made it that far.

 _Good riddance_ , he thought, because that was a fact true of any Pinkerton. 

It was a sorry lot to die alone in the dust, but-- he had the feeling Morgan wasn’t the type to die easy. So long as he had a job and the Pinkertons had the van der Linde name in their books, John imagined he’d be seeing him again.

 

. . .

 

The van der Linde gang lived in each other’s back pockets. They were a bunch so hand in glove with one another (and Dutch the most so), it was incredible when any of them stood out as particularly independent.

Not in _personalities_ , obviously-- they all kept their individual flavors there. But in attitudes toward towns, toward businesses, toward others who stood apart from them; in that, they tended to think alike. Squabble amongst themselves though they might’ve done as bad as any group of folk packed too close together, when it came down to it, theirs was an _us versus them_ lifestyle, and they embraced it.

So when John meandered back to camp a few days late from West Elizabeth, he expected some teasing for being caught like he had. The Del Lobos would never cross the river and he hadn’t spilled anything new about Javier’s whereabouts, so they were an easy thing to take jokes about. Certainly, it didn’t make him feel any worse than his bruises - in body and ego - did.

The Pinkerton, not so much. John tried to keep it to himself for at least one night’s rest in camp, but after being plied with alcohol and Abigail’s single-minded focus on getting out every detail she could (spurred on by Tilly and Karen, naturally), he blurted out that he’d ran into Agent Morgan and his Redbone coonhound yet again. 

_That_ put the hair up on more than a few around the fire, starting with Susan and ending with Dutch.

“Those are no people to be messing with,” Susan blustered, already working herself into a snit.

“You don’t think I know that? Nearly was my head they were putting the screws in.”

“You’re lucky you got away with all your teeth, Marston.” That, from _Micah_ , who hadn’t even been with them a month. “They haven’t been known to take their time in getting down to business.”

“Guess I’m one of the lucky ones,” John shot back, unable to hide his sarcasm (and private bemusement at echoing the very Agent they were dancing around discussing).

“Be more careful,” Abigail said, her teasing dried up in real concern that made him more than a little uncomfortable to face head-on, “your luck won’t hold forever, and-- we need you _here._ ”

That made him think about the year none of them talked about aside from to say they were happy to _see him around again_ , which in turn - as always - sunk him right into a poor mood indeed.

“It’s fine,” he snapped, soured. “Nothing came of it. Got the fellow in the leg with a parting shot, too, so I imagine it’ll be a while before he shows his face again.”

“He shouldn’t be showing his face anywhere near anyone,” came Dutch’s voice from behind him. John winced, turning around slow to see him, Molly and Hosea. Dutch’s eyes glittered in the firelight, pinning John where he sat and making him feel like a kid again, no matter that he’d gotten away fine on his own and hadn’t been followed. “How’d he find you?”

“Don’t know.” Not a great thing to admit, but the truth. Dutch would have to take it as it was. “He’d come for me, that was obvious, and not any of the Lobo boys. No idea how he got whiff that I’d be around, though.

“I didn’t tell him nothing,” he hastened to add, forcing confidence and sincerity into his voice. Didn’t really think about why he needed to force the sincerity, seeing as it was all still the truth, and those at the fire would undoubtedly back him up. “Bastard couldn’t even keep me tied up for a whole hour. And just like last time, he wasn’t the one with the questions.”

“I know you wouldn’t say anything, son,” Dutch placated him, though then he shifted his eyes to the fire and sunk into what appeared to be some contemplative place.

“Peculiar,” Hosea said, looking to Dutch though he didn’t look back, “that they keep sending him out to fetch and nothing more. And an agent no one’s heard of in these parts before, too.”

“I asked around Van Horn,” Javier said, “and nobody up there had heard of him, either.”

“Somebody sent special for us,” Dutch said, his voice caught between amusement and irritation. “Only he’s fixating on you, John. Why’s that?”

“Wish I knew,” John muttered. 

“Might be a new hire,” Tilly proposed, “given how sloppy he’s been.”

“After someone of our reputation? No, they wouldn’t sent just anybody.”

“Newly promoted, then.” 

“He’s got years on me, though not as much as you do, Hosea.” Hosea shook his head, unsurprised. John shrugged. “I get the feeling he and his boss don’t see eye-to-eye much.”

“Why’s that?”

“Maybe he’s on errand duty because they realize he’s best suited to being the muscle and not the brains.”

Abigail said, “Well, if he can’t even keep a hold on one man…”

Hosea smiled, though it wasn’t big. The rest around the fire took the opportunity to break the tension and take the conversation away from such a heavy prospect as the Pinkertons. The Agents were on their tail, yes, and due respect based on their reputation alone, but aside from John, none of them had really _felt_ the chase. They were more like distant demons, or a nightmare remembered hours after waking. Something that occasionally inspired fear if lingered on too long, but otherwise a far off, otherworldly concept. 

John supposed he’d be more worried if it was more than one ill-tempered man and his mangy dog on the job. Framed like that, it was like the Pinkertons weren’t even trying.

He complained as much that evening. Charles, another new addition, gave him a look like he was an idiot for complaining about something like that, but didn’t say anything. 

Karen did. She said, “Great. Now you’ve gone and jinxed us, Marston. The Pinkertons’ll be knocking on our door before we know it.”

‘What door? We haven’t got any doors.”

Abigail said, “Suppose they’ll just have to stay away, then, if we haven’t any doors for them to knock on.” 

That’d set Karen to giggling, which drew Sean over to investigate, which dominoed in many more drinks and just as much more merriment. 

Of course, not a week later, Karen was proven right. 

John just _had_ to go and open his big mouth.

 

. . .

 

They’d set up camp in Tall Trees, by Blackwater. Hosea had a big job in mind that’d take time to pan out, but Micah had caught scent of some in-and-out gig involving a ferry. Bill, Javier and he headed off to investigate its viability-- and John _would’ve_ joined them, except Abigail caught him by the arm as he saddled up Old Boy and told him he _had_ to help her look for Jack.

“Jack’s missing?” Had been John’s first concern, the ferry job disappearing from his mind at her fear and that simple, terrifying concept.

“Since this morning,” she said, then, “and keep your voice down. I don’t want to alarm anybody until we’ve finished looking.”

“Wait,” John then protested, his heart returning to his chest from where it’d jumped into his throat, “you’re telling me the boy’s only been gone since this morning? Kids wander, Abigail.”

“ _Normal_ kids get to wander, John; _our_ kid doesn’t have that luxury, thanks to the stack of bounties lazing around this camp.” 

Her fear hadn’t abated a lick. She pulled his arm again, her expression going pleading. She stepped in closer too, which John couldn’t help but note was the closest she’d gotten to him without either of them being drunk since he’d come back. 

“Please, John. Jack knows to tell me if he wants to leave camp.”

“Alright, alright! We’ll go find the boy.” 

Shaking off the up-down warm-and-cold grip on his heart at her relieved expression, he told himself it was just her overzealous fear pulling him in and there wasn’t actually anything to be concerned about. 

But. 

Genuine worry rarely showed itself on Abigail Roberts, and rarely for any dumb reason. 

So. 

Better safe than sorry. 

Especially when it came to Jack. 

He continued, not looking her in the eyes, “Just… give me a moment to tell the others I won’t be joining them.”

“Thank you, John.”

He waved her off. 

Micah gave him knowing, smirking looks and off-hand comments about being whipped. Before John could tell him where to shove it, Javier told him not to worry, that they were only picking up information, and he could count on being in on the full job. 

As he hadn’t told them - or any of the other prying eyes - it was because Jack was missing, none asked or thought too long about why he and Abigail saddled up and rode out. 

On their way, they stopped and asked Lenny if he’d seen anybody come through during the night or early morning. He said no, paused, and then admitted he’d seen Jack chasing some dog through the brush an hour prior.

“He looked like he was having a grand time, so I didn’t bother him,” he went on to say, missing the way Abigail’s fingers dug into John’s sides. “Dog looked too well-groomed to be a stray. Might’ve come from Manzanita Post. Wherever it came from, they went off that way.”

“Thanks,” John told him, and urged his horse to head to where he pointed.

“He should’ve told me,” Abigail fretted. “Or you. Or somebody.”

“He didn’t know we didn’t know.”

“I suppose.”

“Can you lighten up a little? Those bruises just started fading.”

He knew she was in a worried state as she didn’t have a single barb for him, but rather, just did as asked. 

It grew so tense, he felt he couldn’t much say anything, either.

 _Chasing some dog, huh_ , he thought. That boy must’ve inherited his father’s obliviousness. 

(He wondered if he should say such a thing aloud, but-- not right then. It wasn’t the time to open that can of worms.)

They headed toward the Post. They didn’t make it to the Post.

Because there, in a small clearing off the road next to the area’s lake, was Jack. Happy, carefree Jack, looking like he was having the time of his life building flower-crowns and putting them on Morgan’s damn dog’s head.

The dog kept shaking them off, calm and placid but not seeming to know what to do with the boy that kept putting plants on its head. Much to its bewilderment, every time a crown fell, Jack laughed and tried again.

Morgan sat a ways away on a rock, cigarette dangling out the side of his mouth. He’d dressed like any hunter found in Tall Trees, a bow across his lap and a rifle slung over his back, though John noticed he had his leg stretched oh-so-casually out in front of him. His big horse grazed next to the ground, its tail flicking idling as the lake’s flies bothered it. 

“If it isn’t John Marston,” he greeted the couple as they rode up, as if this were some sort of fucking _social call,_ “and madame… Roberts, isn’t it?”

“Ma! Pa!” Jack hoisted his latest flower crown, a little worse for wear after falling three times, toward them in a child’s oblivious welcome. “Hi!”

“Jack,” Abigail said, voice tense enough to string a note on it, “come here. Please.”

The boy hesitated, his joy immediately cut at the knees at his mother’s obvious distress.

Despite having been besieged with attention, the moment said attention disappeared, Copper inched forward and licked at his mouth, tail wagging.

Jack shoved him back, making a face. “Not now, Copper,” he sternly told the dog. “Hush.”

“Don’t see why you’re in a rush,” Morgan drawled. Lax as he looked, his eyes were sharp as knives. “The boy’s been having fun. And I don’t mean him, nor you, nor _you_ , ma’am, no harm.”

“You lure a boy from his home and then claim you have principles?” Abigail spat.

Morgan shrugged one shoulder. “Wanted to talk. Thanks to Marston there, I’m not feeling much for running after anybody, so… Figured this worked well enough.” 

He glanced toward the boy and dog - the two were taken with one another, Copper’s tail wagging and Jack’s smile wide as he tried and again failed to tell him to stop interrupting - that John would hesitate to call _fond_ but, if pushed, couldn’t think of another word that fit, either. 

Morgan added, “Didn’t tell him to fall in love with Copper. That was all Copper’s fault.”

“If talking’s all you wanted to do,” and John didn’t believe that for a second, unless he accepted talking would always include threatening, “then talk.”

“Alright.” He straightened himself. Cleared his throat. Said, “I want my gun back.”

John stared.

Finally, he choked out a laugh and said, “Excuse me? You want your gun back?”

A frown. “It’s a good gun.”

“I _guess._ Not much different from anybody else’s.”

“Got it from a gunslinger,” Morgan said, “by the name of Boy Calloway. In truth, he wasn’t a great gunslinger, but he had a good gun, and I’d like it back.”

“You are the strangest goddamn Pinkerton I’ve ever met,” John stated.

Morgan squinted his eyes at him. “You’ve never met another Pinkerton.”

“No.” He shifted in the saddle. Behind him, he could hear Abigail’s silent sigh, even if it wasn’t more than a ghost of a breath through grit teeth. “But I know their reputation.”

“And I don’t fit.” Morgan’s eyebrows climbed up. _Why’s that an issue, exactly_ \-- that was what his face asked. 

“Why do you keep bothering us? Following us, hassling us?” Abigail asked, her patience with their back-and-forth gone. She slid off the back of Boy, her fists clenched at her sides as she took a few halting steps toward Morgan. She was as sure as John that he had to be lying, from the start to the end. “Bringing _this_ in front of the boy… That isn’t right.”

Again alerted by his mother’s distress, Jack stopped playing with Copper and started paying attention to the altercation happening not five feet from him.

“Told you,” Morgan repeated, “I want my gun. Not here on any business but that one.”

“I should finish what was started in Gaptooth. This time, I’ll make sure not to miss.” John shifted his hand to his holster-- where, incidentally, Morgan’s gun sat. He was right about it being a good gun.

Morgan’s expression flattened. “You want the boy to see his daddy shoot a man in cold blood, Marston? Be my guest.”

Abigail’s knuckles whitened further. She shot John a look, who didn’t dare break eye-contact with Morgan to give her a look back.

Of course he wouldn’t do that. Maybe he _should_ , just to get Morgan out of their hair, but he wouldn’t.

“You’re damn lucky,” he finally said.

Morgan huffed. Pulled his neglected cigarette from his mouth and snubbed it on the rock he sat on. 

“Never luck. Not for me.” He looked pointedly to John’s holster. “You giving me what’s rightfully mine, or you want to spend another hour posturing like some two-bit rooster?”

Silently mouthing _just give it to him,_ Abigail sharply gestured for him to comply. 

Jack finally got to his feet as John climbed down from his horse. Possibly spooked by the adult’s terse tones, the boy ran to bury his face in his mother’s skirts. Surrounded by broken flowers, Copper quit wagging his tail and looked after him, head cocked.

Pulling the revolver from its holster, John tossed it to Morgan. 

He caught it, checked it, found it apparently still to his liking, and holstered it.

“Thank you,” he said, oh-so-diplomatically. 

“Like hell that was it,” John replied, spitting. “Abigail. Take Jack and go. Me and Morgan have something more to discuss.”

Maybe he really was lucky, as he was sure he’d have gotten a slap for dare implying what he implied -- on that one, it was more Morgan’s presence than Jack’s that saved him.

“I will _not_ ,” she said, clutching Jack closer.

“What’s wrong, ma?” John heard him ask. It made John’s blood boil.

“There's nothing more to discuss.” Morgan pushed himself to his feet without a wince, though John knew that leg had to be hurting him like hell. “I got what I came for. You got who you came for. Our business, for now, is done.”

“Didn’t realize you rats have off-days.”

Again, a shrug. He really was the strangest damned Pinkerton.

“The name’s Arthur Morgan. Feel free to tell your,” a pause, a lip curl, “ _gang_ , that I said hello. Fair warning - I imagine the next time we meet, I won’t be on vacation.”

He tipped his hat - a ratty black thing that John remembered from their previous encounters, otherwise known as the only piece of Morgan’s wardrobe that hadn’t changed - to Abigail with a _ma’am_ , said good-bye to Jack (and received a quiet good-bye in return), and walked himself to his horse. His dog followed as bid, though it gave a lingering look to its new pint-sized friend.

The limp in his left leg became clear when he had to saddle up. John felt a bit of satisfaction over the wince he imagined running across his face, though he ducked his head to hide it behind his hat.

Then, just like that, he was gone. Riding off into the woods, not a single shot fired or demand made.

“We are talking about this,” Abigail told him.

John watched after the Agent until he was fully obscured by trees, and then a bit longer, until the sound of hooves faded. 

Then he said, turning on a heel to face Abigail, “I haven’t any better idea as to what just happened than you do.”

“We’re talking about this _later,_ ” she corrected, with a quick look to the top of Jack’s head. Then, gentler and - to John’s ears - relieved, she said: “Jack, baby. Let’s go home.”

“Can I get a dog?” Jack asked as they all got arranged on Old Boy’s back - Jack in front, Abigail riding side-saddle on back, John in the middle. The horse tossed his head at the number of passengers, but didn’t complain too much when John kept him at a slow walk. 

When John didn’t say a thing (dogs were _okay_ ; that Arthur Morgan the yellow-bellied Pinkerton inspired his kid to have a dog was _absurd_ ), Abigail filled in the resulting silence with a, “We’ll think about it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! follow me on tumblr @ [unkingly](https://unkingly.tumblr.com/) or twitter @ [exkingly](https://twitter.com/exkingly) if you like.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my god you guys are going to make me cry with joy, this fic received much more attention and feedback than I'd ever expected! thank you rdr2 fandom for being so lovely. :D 
> 
> please enjoy this yet-more-ridiculous-build-up!

_Not_ because Morgan told him to but because it was information worth sharing, John went to Dutch and let him know what happened with Jack and Agent Arthur Morgan.

Molly, who’d been sitting quietly in the tent writing a letter, startled when Dutch went from asking John to repeat the name to bidding her and John to leave him. They got all but booted out, the tent flaps drawn shut tight behind them. Inside, silence rang like a bell.

Outside, John and Molly exchanged awkward glances. She still had her paper and pencil clutched to her chest.

“What did you do?” Molly asked him in a low hiss, stepping toward him.

“Nothing!” He hissed back, stepping away. “Told him basically what he already knew! The Pinkertons know we’re here, and they’re probably gonna do something about it sooner than later.”

“That wouldn’t put him in such a mood. Guess he knows this Morgan character.” She gave a distasteful sniff. Then she took her paper and pencil and walked herself to the main table, taking a seat and settling in to watch Tilly and Mary-Beth’s game of dominos. The two girls looked askance at her, and John knew without having to ask that the name Arthur Morgan would be on everybody’s lips by nightfall. 

To ensure such an outcome, Molly had barely sat down before Dutch stuck his head out, looked around with pure annoyance on his face, and then asked John where Hosea and Susan had gotten to. 

When John didn’t know, he told him if he saw them, to send them his way. 

“It’s nothing to worry about,” he then added, though he sounded no less agitated, “just an old ghost rising from the grave. Just-- another thing needing planning.”

“An old ghost?” John echoed. “That doesn’t sound so great, Dutch.”

“I’ll figure it out. Have some faith, John. I just need to talk with Hosea and Susa-- there you are! Hey! Miss Grimshaw! Over here, if you would.”

He bid John to find Hosea, which John did with a thousand questions spinning in his head. By the time he found Hosea relaxing with a book by a tree and told him Dutch needed him, all of them itched to spill out. When he tried to ask them, which included the Pinkerton’s name and Dutch’s reaction, Hosea went pale as death and struggled to answer any in a straight forward way.

Which wasn’t too odd for a Hosea trying to hide something, but usually he was better at improvising his covers. 

“So, it really shook him, too?” 

“Looked like. Don’t think I’ve seen Hosea go that white that fast since Bill shot that bag of flour right over his head.”

“Thought he was the grocer,” Bill defended as Karen and Sean looked to him with clear amusement, “and thought it’d slow him down. It _did_ slow him down.”

“But who’s Arthur Morgan?” Lenny asked, looking to Javier - the second-oldest gang member - and, when he frowned and shrugged, to John.

John also shrugged. “A Pinkerton? And a really bad one? That’s all I know him as.”

“Seems like him visiting was just to tell you his name,” Tilly commented, “and through you, to tell Dutch and them.”

Seemed like. That didn’t sit too right with John.

Fortunately, Abigail had already tucked in with Jack. He’d heard Tilly promise to fill her in on anything that developed once she woke, which was just as well. Whenever he’d tried -- all one times he tried -- to broach the topic of the afternoon, she and he had somehow ended up fighting about something completely different. It was a little exhausting, and he wasn’t sure how to fix it, if there even was a way.

“He thinks ahead.” From Javier. “He may not be as bad a Pinkerton as we think.”

“He may have another agenda,” Charles said. First thing he’d said all day, far as John knew. The fellow was a good hunter and fantastically brutal fighter, but he was also just about the quietest person the van der Linde gang had ever brought on. And that was _including_ when Mary-Beth got so involved in a book she didn’t leave her bedroll for three days.

There was general agreement about that, at least, around the campfire. 

By the end of the night, people gave up on rehashing old theories -- or on grilling John for new details, of which he swiftly ran out -- and none of them felt a lick wiser than when they’d started talking. 

Javier said they’d just have to wait until the so-called old guard got out of their tent and told them what business Arthur Morgan meant for them. Susan left the tent eventually, but she left in foul temper, and flipped any questions no matter how round-about into disparaging comments on their lack of work ethic, hygiene, manners, or all the above.

Whether they liked it or not, they ended up having to agree to wait, as she kept her lip buttoned on their point of interest, and the other two didn’t emerge from the tent for the rest of the night.

 

. . .

 

Morning brought a different story.

Perhaps sensing his camp were full of nosy nancies, Dutch called a meeting first thing.

The ferry job was on, but of those who typically rode out, Hosea, John and Charles would stay behind. 

They would stay behind because Hosea had a plan regarding their Pinkerton friend.

The plan wasn’t discussed aloud, but Dutch did clarify that if they’d heard (they hadn’t) that Arthur Morgan had once been with the gang, the stories were true. 

“He was with us a long time ago,” he said, morose and mournful and everything else a man full of regret over deeds long done could be, “when there weren’t too many of us. We were separated during a job, and he - no older than nineteen - got picked up by hunters and sold off to the law.”

They tried to find him, he said, earnest. They went back for him, as they had always said they would-- and _did_ , when it came to family. Every time. Without fail. 

(A few around the group - Mac, Sean - nodded along with those assertions. John, remembering his own ‘finding’ and warning that he could keep a separate life as long as he kept his head down, stayed quiet.)

But by the time they founda way to him, it’d been near three months, and he’d turned yellow. In exchange for his freedom, he worked for the law. He hadn’t sold Dutch or the gang out, hadn’t meant anything except to survive, Susan swore on it-- but he’d found a new home, and they’d thought it best to leave him to it. Even though they’d raised him like a son better than his dad, who’d swung for larceny.

“If he’s sniffing around our heels, something in his heart’s clearly changed.” Dutch paced in front of them, Hosea and Susan looking on from the sidelines. “We’ve got to figure out what. His information’s old, but it’s-- it’s there. A lot of our tactics, our strategy, we developed when he rode with us.”

“While you lot work over the ferry, we’ll be bringing him in.” At that, Hosea looked to John -- who stared back a moment before nodding. Accepting, without question. “For a little talk. Just to see what he’s shared since his employment with our good friends, the Pinkertons.”

And since he’d apparently sussed out John as his primary target, he’d ride with Hosea. Now that Hosea knew who Agent Morgan was, he was fairly sure he could smoke him out within days.

“This sort of action may bring the Pinkertons to our doorsteps, yes,” Dutch said, cutting off the main concern that whispered through their group, “but it’s clear to me now how they’ve tracked us so well. Without Morgan or his information, they won’t have a _clue_ where to start in finding us.”

“Just as long as we lie low.” Hosea, ever cautious.

“As low as we can and still make a living,” Dutch corrected with good humor. Hosea shook his head, but grinned a touch, too. 

“Right,” Dutch swept his hand to the group that was with him for the ferry. “Let’s ride! Blackwater won’t know what hit ‘em.”

While John watched the majority of the camp saddle up and ride out for a big haul, resentfully wishing Arthur Morgan had decided to fixate on _anybody_ else, Hosea came to his side and told him to saddle up, too. 

Charles was already waiting with Taima. He’d be their scout and back-up, staying out of sight and making sure whenever they did run into Morgan, it wouldn’t end in premature bloodshed.

“A wildier child never before seen,” he told John as they got ready, “that was Arthur. Stubborn as a jackass and twice as mean if he felt he wasn’t being heard. But, despite all that, he was a good kid. Not so different as from when we found you, John.”

His tone got woeful. Nostalgic. John wondered vaguely if he’d ever sound like that when he spoke about Jack, but imagining Jack as any taller than three-feet-some just didn’t feel right.

Hosea continued wistfully, “Smarter than we gave him credit for, to be sure. Dutch and me… We’d just taken to this lifestyle. He was the first to join us. Taught him to read, to hunt, to shoot straight-- well, _straighter._ Kid already had a few murders under his belt by the time we found him, though most of them came from him trying to figure out how to get a bite to eat with his dad gone.”

A dark chuckle and another head shake, like clearing the memories from his head. 

“Sounds like it was a rough loss,” Charles commented, light. 

His expression shuttered closed, his eyes and mouth and everything else drawing down. John hadn’t seen him deflate like that before, his whole countenance turning miserable. Time must have warped Arthur’s memory into something golden— hopefully, meeting the man again, who was distinctly bronze at best, would clear up the nostalgic fog.

“A rough loss. Yes. That’s a good way to phrase it.” Then, quieter, “I feel as if we’re riding out to confront a ghost. To be frank with you boys, I’m not sure how well we’ll fare.”

Maybe that should’ve given rise to concern. It did, a little. Anybody but Hosea, and John might’ve called him on it.

As it was, it was Hosea, who had yet to lose his head in any expedition John had accompanied him on (though admittedly, John was not Hosea’s first pick for partners in crime). 

And, anyway, despite him saying that— he had a plan.

Hosea pointed out that assuming John hadn’t made up or mistook his shot, Arthur having a bum leg meant he’d likely shacked up at the sleepy MacFarlane’s Ranch. It was warm and dry, where he wouldn’t have to overly worry about fending off outlaws, wolves or bears. The Pinkertons certainly paid enough for a man to rent a bed, and the ranchers couldn’t afford to care about where the money came from as long as they were being paid. 

Any questions at either place about an Arthur Morgan would draw him out, Hosea was certain of it. They just had to make sure to leave enough smoke for him to follow without making him scared of wandering straight into a fire.

Charles would provide back-up if they couldn’t subdue him. Hosea told John to keep his temper, to let him do the talking; and then, once he got Arthur to put down any weapons he had-- even if it meant Hosea giving himself up, or pretending to-, John was to jump him. 

It was a simple plan. Straight forward. As there were three of them and only one of him, and he was injured besides, it didn’t seem so bad.

Now if only John could get himself to relax.

“We need him _alive_ ,” Hosea emphasized for the third time as they made their way through the river and back onto solid, flat ground.

“We get it,” John groused, “you want him talking, for whatever good it’ll do any of us.”

Hosea sighed, though the sound was lost to the horses’ hooves. “Thank you for your understanding. Charles, this would be a good time for you to get out of sight and stop associating with us low-lives. We’re coming up on the ranch now.”

Though there weren’t many trees or bends or even shrubbery to get out of sight behind, Charles split from them and did his best. Somehow, he blended into the scenery faster than John thought possible.

And sure enough, MacFarlane’s Ranch came up quickly.

They asked around about an Arthur Morgan, saying he was a son of Hosea’s that they’d been trying to find for ages. Rather: John played at being mute while Hosea played up their imagined family woes.

 _He has a bad case of wanderlust_ , Hosea said. _His work keeps him on the road. It’s been years since we’ve been in the same state, never mind county, as him._

Unfortunately, the ranchers hadn’t heard of him, and they’d had no new visitors in the last few weeks. Hosea spun such a charming, aching-heart story of a lost son they offered him and John a room to wait out the night, which they _graciously_ \- Hosea’s words, not John’s - turned down. 

_We’ll have to keep going if we hope to catch up to him,_ he told them with a sad, exhausted smile. The sentiment wasn’t entirely false, which made John wonder what was and wasn’t part of the show, exactly, but before his concern became pressing he was reminded that the reason Hosea’s lies flowed so smooth was because they usually came with a bit of truth. 

And even if he was sad and forlorning over a lost son returned, the base drive behind the feelings wasn’t so charitable as all that. The second the ranchers wished them luck and turned away, Hosea’s expression twisted into a scowl.

“Damn it, where is that boy?” He muttered under-breath as they headed out to the posts they’d hitched their horses.

Whereupon Hosea and John realized at the same time that the posts were empty, despite those posts definitely being the ones they’d hitched their rides to.

_That wasn’t good._

John blurted, “More importantly, where’s our horses?”

“Like I said last time, Marston. I’m not in the mood for running after anybody, on foot or horse.”

Silence.

“Arthur.”

“Hosea.” This, said after a lengthy pause heavy with the indescribable. Arthur Morgan eyed them both where he stood under the shade of a tree, one shoulder propped against its trunk, his arms crossed tight across his chest. Over his left breast, the dull metal of a deputy’s badge gleamed. “Been a while.”

“So it has. You’ve gotten taller,” Hosea said, taking a slow step forward. John kept his ground, watching their exchange with his hand near his pistol. 

“Seems to me you’ve just gotten shorter.”

“Give me another few years, and I’m sure this old back will send me down that path.”

“Hm.” Then, without his eyes leaving Hosea’s, “Easy now, Marston. These folk lead quiet lives, but they aren’t so unused to outlaws as to be pleasant when they come around shooting. Especially not when they’re shooting at the lawmen here to protect ‘em.”

John rested his fingertips on his gun, unabashed. “And which lawman did you lift that badge off of, Morgan?”

“One that wasn’t using it.” Flippant.

“You took cover in Thieves’ Landing,” Hosea bluffed. Or guessed. Or _knew_ , based on whatever history they had and the unconcerned persona Arthur projected. 

By then, he stood not five paces from Arthur. 

In response, Arthur uncrossed his arms and ventured himself closer, too. Three steps, and they’d be bumping shoulders. One step, and they’d be in swinging range. To be sure, Arthur looked squared up to do just that.

Without swinging his fists, he said, “Never been much of a rancher. Always was a thief.”

“Except now you’re a Pinkerton?” _What happened?_ , begged Hosea’s voice.

“Only difference is one gets shot while the other gets paid, and there’s no predicting which is which before somebody’s dead.” 

“Sounds familiar. Wonder who taught you wisdoms wise as that?”

Arthur’s mouth thinned. “Don’t make this more difficult than it has to be, Hosea.”

Hosea drew himself up, as if he were affronted by the very notion of him making anything difficult for anyone. “And what would _that_ be, Arthur?”

“I’m bringing you in,” he said, point-blank. “Wouldn’t need Marston if I had you, but since he’s here, I figure I may as well be polite and treat you two the same.”

John started in on asking why that might be, but Hosea cut him off-- by _raising his hands_ and _surrendering._

“Alright,” he said, “alright. Nobody has to get hurt. I’ll go with you quietly. But,” and here he gave a little backwards glance to John, his expression the same as it’d been when he’d described to the ranchers how much he missed his poor, wayward son, “leave him. You said it yourself, you only need me.”

By the tightness in his jaw and muscle that jumped along his neck as he most likely ground his teeth together, Arthur didn’t care for that one bit. 

Still, he kept his tone nice and level. Almost friendly-- as friendly as a crocodile’s smile, anyway. 

“And I corrected myself. Thought I was real clear on that.” He gestured for Hosea to turn around, his other hand dropping to his hip.

John pulled his gun at the same time as Arthur drew his. Unfortunately, Arthur had his jammed under Hosea’s chin, a glint of steel along its muzzle and in his eyes; John, meanwhile, had one hell of a bad angle and little chance in downing Arthur first.

Of course, Hosea jumped to calm the situation. Told John to drop the gun. Told Arthur he didn’t need his gun. Told them both that he much favored a clean resolution, even if it meant two of the three ending up in irons.

Looking neutral on the matter if not particularly unenthused, Arthur said nothing. Didn’t need to, with the gun under Hosea’s chin doing all the talking for him.

Eventually, the whites of Hosea’s eyes (which were not, John thought, part of his usual sweet-talking) and the calm surety in Arthur’s made John put down his gun.

After that, things moved quick. Arthur didn’t lower his from Hosea’s head, and even threatened to do more than simply hold it there if Hosea insisted on telling him _it wasn’t necessary_. After that, Hosea went quiet. John added yet another reason he wouldn’t be too unhappy when they finally put the bastard out of their misery.

The gun didn’t lower as they headed away from the ranch, John in the lead with Arthur and Hosea three paces behind. Directed to move off the trail and into some brush, John started in that direction-- and then froze, as Arthur barked at him to _stop._

“Make up your damn mind what you want us to do,” John snapped, perhaps unwisely.

Arthur narrowed his eyes at him, and jabbed his gun harder into Hosea’s throat. “I know you got a third skulking around out here. Call him off, or I swear, I won’t be sent off to hell alone. Despite _my_ preference, the Pinkertons are only picky about retrieving one fellow, and he ain’t named Hosea Matthews.”

He didn’t know they had a look out. 

He couldn’t know that.

He was bluffing. There was no way in hell he’d seen Charles sneaking around; hell, most _deer_ didn’t catch sight of Charles sneaking until it was far too late.

Hoping for direction, John looked to Hosea.

Hosea’s adam’s apple bobbed against the muzzle. He looked like he was reworking their plan.

John just hoped he knew what he was doing, as he was the one to call out, “Mr. Smith. If you’d be so kind as to introduce yourself - _nicely_ \- to Mr. Morgan. It appears he isn’t a fan of skulking, despite partaking in a fair bit of it himself tonight.”

Arthur let that jab slip by. His eyes searched the dark underbrush and nearby clifftops, his whole body tense.

The tension didn’t disappear when Charles appeared. Charles had his repeater up and loaded, looking as deadly as he was; it took a fair bit of convincing from Hosea to get him to lower it, but eventually, just as John had, he did.

Maybe he and Charles were Hosea’s real marks. Certainly, John felt like he’d been conned as Arthur stripped them of their weapons, directed them to a prison wagon, and loaded them up like common criminals too stupid to run. As the heavy bolt clunked into place and Arthur pocketed the key, John shot Hosea a _what the hell are we doing now, then?_ look. It might’ve been more scowl than not, but-- understandably-- he wasn’t particularly fond of being locked in cages.

While he rubbed feeling back into his neck with the gun finally pulled away from it, Hosea returned a meaningful look of _trust me_. 

_Meaningfully untrustworthy,_ John thought sourly. 

To his surprise, Arthur didn’t crow about his captives. He lingered a moment, sure, their gunbelts and weaponry slung over his shoulders, but only to look them all over with a critical eye.

Charles - having given Hosea just as much of a _what are we getting ourselves into, old man_ look as John had - met his stare head-on.

Arthur held it. Said, “Charles Smith. Isn’t it.”

“What of it?”

“Just confirming. You’re a relatively new face.”

Charles quirked an eyebrow. _And?_ he seemed to say. 

There was an _and_ , all of them could see it clear as day on Morgan’s face. It was a big _and_ , quite possibly a lecture fit to put the most droning, boring priest to shame. 

But he swallowed it, whatever it entailed. Instead, he nodded toward John, his eyes shifting to Hosea.

“I heard you picked him up when he was a boy.”

“Do I look like a boy any longer?” John asked.

Arthur’s nose scrunched. “Sure emotional as one.”

“As you know, some of us take longer than others to mature,” Hosea said, even-keeled and nearly like he was letting Arthur in on a joke, as if Arthur were _still_ his old friend. “It’s true that he’s been with us a while. Near as long as you had been, before...”

“Before they dragged me off in chains and you left me to die?”

“Easy now,” John told him, echoing him from before with a sense of darkly ironic unease. He had a lot of guns on his shoulders, and they had none. The cage wasn’t so thickly barred as to shield them from a bullet.

“Is that what this is about?” Hosea asked, his tension expertly - but not completely - hidden. It took someone who’d learned to play poker from him to see the tell. “I feared it might be. We went back for you, Arthur. You didn’t want to come back to _us._ ”

Unfortunately, Arthur had also, apparently, learned poker from him.

“Is that what he told you?” He snarled, cryptically. “That I didn’t want to come back to the best goddamn home I knew. That I wanted to be left on some godforsaken prison farm, wondering when they’d finally decide to string me up.”

That threw Hosea for a loop. He paused, then asked, “What do you mean?”

“I mean, Hosea, despite all his talk, and all your talk, you two turned out to be exactly like the rest.” 

Arthur backed up further, agitated. Put his fingers to his mouth and whistled, sharp. In the distance, a horse nickered in answer, but before it even showed its face - surely Arthur’s fine brute of a steed - Arthur rounded the wagon and climbed aboard its seat. Without lighting a lantern to guide the way, he startled his lazy, half-asleep horses into moving with a crack of the reins, the two jerking the cart forward and out of the brush he’d run it through. 

“I’m sure we could talk about this,” Hosea tried, shuffling closer to the driver’s seat as the wagon set to rocking. 

He looked white even considering the moonlight. The whole situation felt too deep and old for John to want to touch, though he privately thought it just his luck that he and Charles were dragged into the thick of it without fully realizing.

Then again, maybe they should’ve. If a name alone rattled Dutch into making new plans, he should’ve known to take the matter to heart.

Too late for that, though.

“I’m sure you’d like to.” Arthur didn’t look back. “Master conman with a tongue as silver as the stolen cutlery in your pockets. No, I don’t think we could talk, as I stopped listening to your words when I realized they was empty as your promises.”

“Arthur--”

“He won’t come for Marston or Smith,” with a voice harsh and bitter and five layers of hurt, each sporting another reason he wouldn’t mind seeing them all shot _after_ some creative interrogation, “but I reckon he _might_ come for you. May be wishful thinking on my and your parts, though.”

“They weren’t going to hang you,” Hosea said, insistent despite the bell-ringing warning in Arthur’s tone, “they offered you work. Dutch said you took it.”

“In _Guarma._ You ever been to Guarma, Hosea?” The wagon rattled and jumped as they rolled over wild terrain and, finally, onto the dirt path leading toward Blackwater. “It’s where they send men too ignorant and desperate to say no.”

“We didn’t know.”

“Dutch knew.” 

He cracked the reins again, spurring the horses into as fast a pace as their burden allowed. Behind them, Arthur’s usual horse cantered into view.

“Maybe so, but _I_ didn’t,” Hosea said, “and these two certainly didn’t. If it’s revenge you’re out for, Arthur, leave the rest of our people out of it.”

“Revenge ain’t the reason.” Muttered, barely caught under all the noise: _not really. Haven’t decided._

“Then why show up after so long?”

As they neared the border’s river, a far-off dog brayed.

Suddenly silent, Arthur kept his face away from Hosea.

Just as John was about to tell him to at least pull up a little before he crashed them into a ditch, he slowed the horses to a more reasonable pace. The horses, happy to take an easier time of it, did so immediately.

Hosea glanced back to John and Charles; as they certainly didn’t have any ideas to offer, he looked back to Arthur.

The distant dog, again, howled its rasping howl.

The wagon’s clattering didn’t allow for soft voices or sentimental pleas, but Hosea nonetheless put on a show of trying. “Arthur. I’m sorry. I never would’ve left you if I’d known.”

“Quiet,” Arthur snarled back.

“I mean what I say--”

“ _Quiet_ ,” Arthur repeated, pulling the horses to a full stop just before the riverbed. 

Behind them, Buell stopped, too, the horse snuffling noisily at the cart as it did so. John eyed it, not too pleased with the idea that it was their best bet at a fast get-away if they got out of the cage. It was probably as fussy as the Count on who climbed atop its back.

He didn’t contemplate the horse too long, however, as their drive made a more curious sight. Still as stone, Arthur had his head cocked toward the dog’s howling. 

Which happened again in no short order, sounding… much closer.

Beyond the howling was the stamping of too many horses to bode well for any of them.

For the first time, John started to seriously wonder how they were getting out of this one.

“ _Damn_ it, Copper.” From Arthur, who wasted no time in hopping down from his seat. He shrugged off his stolen guns, picking up only the rifle he’d pilfered from Charles. “Led them straight to us.”

“Led who?” Charles asked, moving toward the door -- not that it helped any.

“Del Lobos. They’ve got perfect timing, as always.”

“Didn’t you kill a few of their men in Gaptooth?”

“After they shot at me, sure.”

“Sure.” Deadpan.

“Or, imagine this: they figured out your real, bona fide occupation. Funny, they like it about as much as we do.”

Arthur ignored John’s dry quip. He rounded the wagon as if he meant to face them all down himself-- except judging by the noise the horses kicked up from around a cliff edge and a distance besides, there had to be at least a dozen. Moreover, in his haste, his limp became much more pronounced. 

Out manned and slow besides, he didn’t stand a chance. He would’ve been better off telling them what sort of grave he wanted, not that they’d be able or willing to go back for his body.

“We’ll be sitting ducks.” Charles, voice low, to John and Hosea. 

“They knew my face. Reckon they know at least yours, too, Hosea.”

Hosea didn’t even look their way. Instead he stared at Arthur’s back, his hands still over his knees. 

Said only, quiet, “Arthur?”

The horses thundered closer. Mens’ voices began to make themselves distinct. 

The dog brayed. Loud. Around the bend, maybe.

Just as Arthur seemed set on facing down their death sentence head-on, he swore, viciously and under his breath. 

“Damn it.”

Then he swore again, and again, “God _damn_ it, shit,” all under breath-- and turned on a heel, rifle dropped to one hand. The other, he dug around his pocket until he pulled out their wagon’s key.

“I ain’t risking putting your blood on their hands. Get out of here,” he growled at them as he unlocked the cage and swung its doors wide. “Take your guns and go.”

Though he didn’t quite believe he wasn’t going to be shot in the back, John didn’t need to be told twice.

Neither did Hosea or Charles. The latter, Arthur returned his rifle to without a fuss. After, he hastened to back up as if his decision to let them go was liable to burn him with longer exposure. 

“We could take them together.” From Hosea, lingering a ways from the cart, half-turned back to Arthur. He had a foot in Buell’s stirrup, hoisting himself up with his revolver already in hand. This time, he didn’t bother hiding how his leg hurt him, and neither did John feel as much satisfaction over seeing it. “There’s enough of us--”

“ _Get,_ ” he snapped back, cutting Hosea off, “before I come to my senses about letting you walk.”

For a second longer, Hosea hesitated. Wavered. Like he wanted to stay anyway, some old, misguided cord tying him to the ungrateful Pinkerton’s side.

Then John said, “You heard the man. Let’s get,” and the cord snapped -- and Hosea beat a retreat into the sparse woods fast as John’s and Charles’, only looking back to check they weren’t being followed.

To John’s open surprise, Charles’ absolute bewilderment and Hosea’s quiet amazement, they weren’t. Instead, despite being one to their three, Arthur spurred his horse the opposite direction from where they headed-- and even took a few potshots as he went, though he was too far to have reliably struck any of his pursuers. 

The gunshot got their attention, however. With whooping cries in Spanish that John didn’t follow aside from the insults (the majority of which had to do with equating lawmen with donkeys), they tore after the golden horse and its rider. At the head of the pack ran Copper, whose braying finally ceased as the dog realized its owner wasn’t too pleased with its excellent tracking skill.

Aside from feeling jostled around and Hosea going uncharacteristically quiet, they made it out of their first joint meeting with Arthur Morgan just fine. 

The only true loss was their horses, which refused to show no matter how they called and so they were forced to leave behind. As consolation, they doubled back to the prison wagon and, after ensuring the coast was clear (it was), loaded up and rode it out, horses and all. 

“I imagine Mr. Morgan won’t hold our entrepreneurial spirit against us.” From Hosea. “After all— oh, what was it he’d told you? Right. After all, he’s not using it.”

“Do you think he meant it when he said he wasn’t here for revenge?” Charles, to Hosea.

“I won’t pretend to know the mind of a Pinkerton rat,” Hosea replied, blithe— and then, a tad more somber, perhaps remembering whatever had possessed him to put more than good acting into his talk with Arthur, “but, yes. I believe he believes it isn’t for revenge.”

“And instead it’s for…?”

“What do we do anything for? Money, most likely.”

That sounded right to John, but Charles didn’t look as convinced.

“He didn’t have to let us go.”

Hosea grumbled and shrugged, hunching forward - much like Arthur had, actually, when he hadn’t been fond of the topic. 

“I reckon he had a lot of options running through his head. Why he settled on this one, well - more the fool he for it.”

And that ended that. 

Before they could sink too deep into the mire of their close call, John cleared his throat. The other two looked his way, eyebrows raised.

“Anyway. Here’s hoping his boss gives him hell over losing this fine wagon.”

Charles snorted, agreeing despite his indecision over Arthur’s intent. Hosea chuckled, the grim shroud over his shoulders shrugged off for a while longer.

 

. . .

  
If they’d hoped to share what they’d learned upon their return to camp, it was a hope dashed. They returned to a half-dismantled camp and everyone in disarray. It was a miracle they came back when they did, they found out, as the van der Linde gang was on the move, and _fast._

The ferry job had gone more than south. It’d been a disaster.

An inept and soft-hearted Pinkerton, ghost or not, would have to wait. For those that survived the ferry and those busy filling in for those who didn’t return, survival became their one and only priority.

 

. . .

 

For two blessed months, Arthur Morgan kept himself where he belonged: out of sight.

Now if only he could’ve also kept himself out of their minds.

Thing was, Dutch kept a standing order on Morgan’s capture. _Alive_ , he said, _and I don’t mean that as a preference_. But if the Pinkerton had been clingy as a flea on a dog prior to their water-logged disaster, they’d frozen him off in their run through the mountains. 

John reckoned he’d been taken off their case given his string of failures, but Dutch wouldn’t hear of it. On his worse days, he harped on Morgan being the source of their woes. Far as John knew, Hosea kept his mouth shut on the topic. If Dutch heard about Arthur’s opinion over him being left behind intentionally, he didn’t hear it from John or Charles; if Hosea brought it up, he did so where no one overheard them.

Sometimes it was best to let Dutch talk himself out. He’d get back on track eventually. He always did.

So they put their heads down and squabbled amongst themselves as well as their energy allowed, because at least so long as they nipped at each other’s faults and flaws, they knew each other were still kicking.

The O’Driscoll train job got them out of the mountains, but it was working over Valentine that got Arthur Morgan to take second priority in Dutch’s mind.

Valentine stank like shit for miles, had not a shred of shine in its dirt- and piss-encrusted roads, and was, all together, like balm for their Blackwater burns. Kieran Duffy (who was locked up safe, sound and hungry in the prison wagon they’d, somehow, kept) served as a reminder of them being family, as they fetched back Sean but no one came for the ex-O’Driscoll. Micah spent some time in Strawberry jail, but Bill and Javier busted him out eventually and then - because apparently he’d needed convincing to leave a stupid job behind - forced him back to camp. The girls brought in money and ideas; Hosea broke an arm and gained a nasty scar fending off a so-called legendary bear (-- _”It looked to make my mug match yours, John, but lucky for me, Charles had other ideas” --_ ), but it healed alright.

Abigail and he weren’t exactly on the best of terms-- nothing like they’d been before he’d left and (during the longer days) before Jack arrived-, but she and he could at least sit around the fire without starting a spat. She’d even let him sling an arm over her shoulders sometimes, if the laughter got loud enough and the drinks kept pouring. 

Yet, when he proposed they head out for a bit of time together, him drunk on the idea they were getting good enough for that, she dismissed him with utmost prejudice. Said Jack took up all her time, and that she didn’t trust Uncle to watch him, and that the other girls were too busy, and a whole mountain of excuses besides.

But then she’d say they could sit in his tent, and-- they talked. A bit. Mostly, they didn’t, but there was only so much blame John was willing to put solely on himself for that.

Anyway. It worked out. It was all working out.

Business was on the up. They got their feet under them.

And that was when, _of course_ , when Arthur Morgan again showed his face.

It happened during a rare hunting trip with Charles Smith (-- an irony and parallel to their last joint meeting that John didn’t miss). John had never been much of a hunter. Not like Hosea or Charles, anyway, who both took some strange pleasure in sitting silent in the muck or a tree for hours on end while getting swarmed with bugs.

Charles hadn’t asked him to go. He’d only taken John because John needed to get out of the camp after asking Abigail to take off for a few days in town went so bitterly sour, and Charles packing up with enough equipment to last a few days had seemed the best option. 

Charles had given him an _are you sure_ look that John shrugged off.

So off they’d gone, an unlikely duo, into the Heartlands.

Pearson wanted deer or pronghorn, which was easy enough. 

Charles wanted buffalo. 

John had never hunted buffalo.

This, he gave as the reason they startled and subsequently lost an entire herd on first approach.

“You kept saying to pick off the one on the right, but they moved so fast, they all might as well have _the one on the right_.”

“We’ll have to set up camp and start again tomorrow,” Charles said rather than chew him out as he looked like he wanted to. “They’re too riled to approach now.“

“What’s that mean for us?”

“At worst, stampeding. You ever seen a man gored by a buffalo, John?”

“Seen a man gored before, sure. By a bull. Boar. Not a buffalo, though, I suppose.”

“They’re vindictive as boars when they’re mad, but ten times the size. Sometimes they won’t leave off a body ‘til it’s mashed up like pulp.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“I’m not. It’s a gruesome sight. Hard to forget.”

That couldn’t be right, but John really didn’t know enough about buffalo to argue. In any case, Charles made his point: John needed to up his hunting game.

They turned their horses-- two relatively new mares, freshly stolen from sleeping hunters on their way down from the mountains (John, personally, missed Old Boy’s easy handling)-- away from the open prairie.

As they came upon dried riverbed and the sparse trees clinging to its edges, agreeing easily it made for the best cover and spot they’d find without getting too far from the buffalo, they ran into him. 

(If John felt gracious, he’d admit - like Charles did - that Arthur hadn’t been seeking them out. He didn’t feel gracious often, however, and he hadn’t made it so far as an outlaw by being less than absolutely wary over _coincidences._ )

They spotted him first.

Hard not to, as he had his back to them and his eyes glued to some glossy pieces of paper. Dressed in a casual gunslinger’s garb, his black hat a beacon of identification on his head, he stood talking to some soft-looking, brown bearded photographer. His big ass of a horse grazed nearby, his damn tracking dog laying, panting, next to it.

A few ways to approach flashed through John’s head (he was more used to ambushing humans than buffalo). All went out the window as Charles nudged his grey mare forward, straight-on toward Morgan-- and Morgan, alerted by the jangle of guns and snorting of a horse, looked up.

“What are you doing?” John hissed at Charles, but nonetheless tapped his heels into his horse’s sides and got her moving to follow.

“I was thinking foxes next,” the photographer was saying, enraptured enough in the conversation not to stop because of his partner’s looking away and sudden stillness, “though it really is a shame the camera can’t catch color. Their red coats are much more vibrant when attached to the living thing. 

“But if not foxes, then eagles--- Arthur? What are you looking at-- … Oh. Hello.”

“Hello,” Charles said, calm as you please. He even nodded to their Pinkerton buddy. “Mr. Morgan.”

The photographer looked to Arthur, apparently oblivious to the tension. “Friends of yours? What a happy coincidence.” 

“Sure is, Mr. Mason.” Arthur’s voice was low, gruff. His hand rested on top of his revolver, idle. “Been a while. So long I’m afraid I’ve forgotten if they’d want anything out of me.”

Mason frowned slightly. Whether he was offended by Arthur’s rude tone or catching on to the tension, John couldn’t say.

John figured he better talk than lurk, if he’d picked up on Charles’ tone right. “Just wanted to stop by, seeing as we was in the area and happened to notice Copper over there.”

The corner of Arthur’s mouth twitched. “He can be hard to miss. Then, you’re both just here to talk? Now why do I find that hard to believe?”

“Are you local… hunters?” Mason asked. 

He went ignored.

John said, “You need me to bring my kid every time we want to talk?”

“Well, hell, if you’re offering. He’s got a better head on his shoulders. Makes for more stimulating conversation.”

“We’re just here to talk,” Charles confirmed firmly, giving John a sharp look as his hackles rose.

“In that case,” Arthur put his eyes on Charles, “I’ve actually got something I want out of you.”

They tensed.

He said, deadpan, “My wagon.”

“Your wagon,” Charles echoed.

“These gentlemen stole your wagon?” Mason looked offended on all their behalfs, at least until he could determine who exactly deserved the affront.

John guffawed. He wasn’t sure if he should be annoyed at Arthur pulling the same stupid _give me my stuff back_ line as before and-- well, alright, he was a little annoyed, but mostly, he was exasperated.

“We was safekeeping it,” he told Mason, to keep his head on straight. As much as it could be, anyway, given them talking over his head. “On account of, we was just-- uh, heading into town. Together. Then we got in a… roadside incident, and Mr. Morgan had to take off, which left us with it.”

“ _In_ it,” Charles muttered.

Mason, fortunately, missed the comment. “Oh! What good friends. Taking your wagon back to town for you.”

“Sure,” Arthur muttered, his expression dark as storm clouds. “That was… definitely what happened.”

“If you wanted your wagon,” John continued, “you could’ve come for it anytime.”

“Except y’all _moved,_ and didn’t leave no forwarding address.”

Charles said, “Didn’t think you’d have trouble finding us. You never did before.”

“Then, this is a fortunate meeting, indeed.” Mason laughed. It seemed genuine. John didn’t have the foggiest idea how it could be so genuine, with all the unspoken barbs and narrowed eyes being thrown around. Fellow really was oblivious. “Why don’t you head back with them now, Mr. Morgan, and get your wagon? I’ve good film ready to be developed, thanks again to you.”

Arthur snapped out of his gloom, instead looking like he wanted to fight Mason leaving-- but as Charles and John remained unhelpfully silent and Mason started packing up his camera and its stand, beaming all the while, he stood no chance. 

He deflated. Muttered, “It wasn’t nothing. Thanks for, uh, the prints.”

“As I said, it’s the least I could give.” A bright smile for Morgan, who just nodded back, shuffling awkward on his feet. Then, a tip of the hat for Charles and John. “Gentlemen! It was nice meeting you. You’ve a good friend in Mr. Morgan here; why, I’d be in some wolf’s belly right now if it weren’t for him. All of you, take care.”

Charles tipped his head. “Take care.” 

John said, surprised that his talking and fumbling had worked out but hiding it, “Same to you, Mr. Mason.”

“Watch out for coyotes if you head to the old mill,” Arthur called after him as he saddled up and began away. “There’s a big one that’s not afraid of people. Especially not the ones who try to pet it.”

“Yes, yes!” Mason raised a hand in farewell, not turning back. “I’ll try my best to remember: nature is always meaner than I expect!”

“Clumsy fool’s going to get himself killed,” Arthur muttered under his breath, wearily concerned. 

Then he turned an unhappy eye to the pair of them, his shoulders tensing up and his fingers tighter around his revolver’s handle--

“John. Put down the gun.”

John looked at Charles incredulously, his pistol not wavering from where he’d drawn and aimed it at the Pinkerton’s damn head (where he _should’ve_ aimed, all those moons ago).

Charles missed it, as he had his eyes on Arthur. Going by his expression, he wasn’t happy about what he was saying, either. Nonetheless, he said it. Repeated it, even.

“We’re here to _talk._ No one needs to be shot.”

“Sounds familiar,” Arthur said, warily sizing up John and his gun. His own sat at its hip, though John knew him to be a quick enough draw for that not to matter much. “And something I’d be much amenable to, if I didn’t reckon you boys have something else in mind for me.”

“We would,” without blinking and barely breathing, from John’s standpoint, “but you didn’t have to let us go during our last meeting. There were three of us; they were bound to leave alive one of us if you fought them off. Consider this a fair trade for that.”

“He didn’t _have_ to catch us, neither,” John pointed out, indignant.

“Since when does fairness matter any in this line of business?” Arthur asked, suspicion unabated.

“Knowing our location, knowing where some of us are --” John tried not to bristle, though again Charles didn’t look his way, “-- with just that, I reckon you could’ve been playing a whole lot dirtier in catching us. Figure there must be a reason you haven’t.”

“If you reckon fairness to be one of them, you’re dumber than I thought.”

“Whatever you think your reasons are, you’ve been easy on us.” A little, barely-there smirk. “Reckon we could pay you the same favor. Seems like you could use it.

Insofar as an outlaw telling a lawman’s pet such, it was one hell of an insult. Arthur stewed in that. Chewed his cheek and white-knuckled the handle of his revolver.

John, watching all this play out and hating the stand-off (without actually being a stand-off) that followed.

“Shit.” Slowly, he put down his gun. Re-holstered it. And, on Arthur looking over, flipped him the one-finger salute. “Reckon you should get out of here before we _come to our senses_ , Morgan. Could show you to that wagon of yours, alright.”

And yet, the fool lingered.

Only a second more. Only enough time to tell them all with a scowl and no words that he absolutely would and happily could give them a fight.

But then he said, looking at Charles with narrowed eyes, “As you said, consider us _even_ ,” and turned and walked himself to his horse. He loaded up. He glanced back, once more.

Charles’ horse stamped her hoof with impatience, her tail flicking. 

John shouted, “What? Change your mind?”

Charles rolled his eyes, but Arthur didn’t take the bait. 

He swung Buell around and galloped away, Copper barking at his heels.

“What was that, just now? Besides strange as all hell?” John commented after he’d disappeared over a hill. “I can’t figure him out.”

“Don’t reckon he’s trying as hard as he could. It’s like he doesn’t want us caught.”

John didn’t know what to make of that idea, so instead pointed out the other obvious, true fact. 

“Dutch’ll be pissed we let him go.”

“You’re going to tell Dutch?”

John blinked. 

Looked to Charles, who looked back. Steady.

“Reckon not,” John said, slow. Dutch _would_ be pissed. And with how easy he was lately with throwing accusations of people not pulling their weight or being _too_ uppity and bringing attention to them, they were liable to get more than just an earful. “Not if you don’t.”

“I won’t. If you don’t.”

A pause. The only notable noise came from some far-off train, its whistle interrupting the insects’ buzzing and birds calling.

“Alright.” John cleared his throat. Didn’t know why this felt like such a big thing, as it wasn’t like John hadn’t hidden things from Dutch before. The difference was obvious, though - before, the things he didn’t share didn’t matter to the gang at large. “What Dutch don’t know, don’t hurt him.”

Charles nodded, once. 

“Let’s make camp.” 

John told himself not to dwell on it, but once they were bundled down around the fire and they found nothing to discuss except Charles instructing him on how to properly wrangle a buffalo, his mind refused to listen to the good hunting advice and instead lingered on Arthur Morgan. A Pinkerton, a former gang member, and a man who saved oblivious photographers from wolves. A man on a revenge mission who didn’t fight press an advantage. 

How he’d lived so long being such a mess of contradictions, John didn’t know.

But then, he felt fairly sure he’d one day find out. Just as the van der Linde gang couldn’t run forever, neither could Arthur Morgan.

If the world had any fairness at all, they’d run each other into the ground.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> charles be nice to john, he's.............. trying.
> 
> also this was supposed to be ot3 only but 1) you can't tell me the gang wasn't doomed to open poly from the start and 2) Charles & Arthur refuse to be in the same scenes without it being gay, set up for gay, or used-to-be gay, so hmm them's the rules I guess.
> 
> anyway, thanks again for reading!! follow me on tumblr @ [unkingly](https://unkingly.tumblr.com/) or twitter @ [exkingly](https://twitter.com/exkingly) if you like.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **warning** that the "hurt" of "hurt/comfort" officially begins here: implied animal cruelty, torture, and some body horror. everything is canon-typical, but that's not the most helpful warning, is it. :b
> 
> absolutely no sexual abuse occurs. 
> 
> also the AU side of this story really kicks in from here on out (as if it hadn't already). lot of dynamics and character backgrounds/personalities shift due to Arthur not being in camp. nonetheless, I hope they still ring true and are enjoyable to read!

“We got him! Make way-- we got ourselves a Pinkerton spy.”

“Dutch, you here?”

“Right here, Mr. Escuella. And who’s that you’re saying you got?”

Maybe they’d lost their tempers and maybe Valentine had gone south enough to necessitate another move, but the van der Linde gang wasn’t stopped so easily. Rhodes fit them not quite as well, and rose the stress for Tilly and Lenny and Charles something fierce, but-- they didn’t exactly have a choice in the matter. Abigail saw that plain as she’d always seen it. Didn’t make it easier to uproot and relocate everything, though, especially as they hadn’t _really_ been in Horseshoe Overlook too long.

But that was just the state of things. Same as the sky was blue, the grass was green, and the fellow Javier and Bill dragged in was in for a rough time.

First things first. Abigail took Jack by the arm and told him to take Cain (the dog that was not ‘pretty as Copper’ but was, at least, his) and go catch the fish by the dock with his net as he’d been wanting to do endlessly, and not to leave until she’d fetched him.

Thankfully, he didn’t need telling twice. He gathered his dog and ran off, taking himself as far from the camp’s mid-afternoon commotion as she felt safe sending him without supervision.

“Took a while, but we got him. Caught him at the post office asking about Trelawney. Gave us a hell of a chase, all the way up to Emerald Ranch,” Javier was saying as Abigail put herself by Pearson’s mess tent, which gave her a good view of the hogtied individual Javier had dragged in. It also meant she stood between Kieran and Sadie, which was a particular spot to be while witnessing this particular event.

Sadie gave her a glance and nod, her expression unhappy and grim over the proceedings. Loyalty to Dutch, she undoubtedly had; her place in the gang, she had yet to find. Most mornings started out with her and Pearson having a tiff over him asking her to do work, which was an unpleasant way to wake the camp that nobody, including Sadie, had fixed (though she had her ideas, they involved her running with the men; consequently, the men weren’t too fond of the idea). On the other hand, Kieran gave her a glance and then shuffled himself a step away, his hands clasp tight in front of him. Looking at how they’d tied up their newcomer, he rubbed at his wrists, perhaps thinking of his own time in such a position.

“Arthur Morgan.” 

At his name, Arthur turned his head to the side and spat a glob of red.

Bill - who sported signs of struggle himself, in the swelling around his eye and stained gauze hastily wrapped around his arm - had him by the shoulders, forcing him to kneel in the dirt. The close eye demonstrated caution in excess, as even ignoring his bindings, he looked black, blue and red enough to not see straight, never mind run.

Dutch stood on the edge of his tent’s platform. Focused though he was on Arthur, Dutch was nothing if not a showman; even where he watched with the interest a hawk gave a caught rabbit, his voice carried across his audience. A quick scan proved that everyone but Uncle, Pearson and Sean - who’d gone to Rhodes to _double-check the saloon’s quality_ \- were present. 

Susan was white in the face, but kept her chin determinedly up. She gripped the sides of her skirts, her flinty gaze on Arthur. 

Hosea looked much the same, though significantly more morose, if not outright regretful.

“Long time no see, son. Between you and me, anyway, as I’ve been hearing nothing but reports of you bothering my people.” 

“Son?” Voice dull and hoarse. The purpled swelling along his jaw did his speaking no favors. “This’s how you welcome your sons back, is it?”

“The ones that’ve strayed, yes. The ones that have broken the rules and betrayed me. Betrayed us.”

“Never did nothing you didn’t start.”

As he spoke, he struggled to keep his head up; every ten seconds, it started tilting to one side or another. If it weren’t for the pride in his spine and Bill’s hands on his shoulders, Abigail thought, he’d have been flat on his face. Though he kept his face toward Dutch, the weight of the camp’s eyes obviously weighed on him.

They’d brought him in on the back of Bill’s horse, his cream-colored, riderless horse led by rope behind them. By the streaks of mud caked over blood and fraying along the back of his light jacket, he hadn’t spent the entire ride on the back of somebody’s horse.

(An unusual sign of cruelty, in Abigail’s opinion-- but. Maybe he’d made it necessary. She didn’t know. She’d felt like doing worse than dragging him behind a horse when he’d lured Jack away, no matter that he hadn’t hurt the boy; this, she supposed, was just what he deserved.

She wondered a little when she’d started thinking like that, but the answer was clear: when it’d become as necessary as every other scrupulous deed they engaged in.)

Dutch laughed. It was not a pleasant sound.

“ _I_ , whose every principle, every ideal, every dream runs _counter_ to the terror and chaos the Agency strikes in good people’s hearts, started _you_ on the path of joining them? On the path of hunting down your own?”

Arthur’s chin dropped against his chest. His breathing was slow, measured, and whistling on the exhale. 

He didn’t reply.

After a moment, Bill shook him roughly by the shoulders. “Look at who’s talking to you. Show some damned respect, maggot.”

Just like that, the building anger dropped from Dutch’s face.

Holding out a hand to halt Bill, he stepped off his platform. Stopped not two steps from Arthur.

Said, “No… No, Bill, it’s alright. There’s no need to rush our friend into anything he’s uncomfortable with.” 

Arthur huffed a laugh, though it sent him into a coughing fit that he struggled to control. By the end, he attempted again to straighten-- and managed it, though barely. Now his breath really wheezed, pinched by a rib undoubtedly broken.

Dutch talked over the coughing. “All that is ancient history, anyway. What matters is how much you’ve told them.”

Faint, so much so Abigail strained to catch it: “Don’t matter. Not actually. You won’t believe what I’ve got to say.”

“You’re right. Which is why you’ll be telling us where to go to retrieve what you’ve said.”

Confusion edged its way into Arthur’s frown, in the pinch between his eyebrows and the way his eyes searched Dutch’s face. 

“I’ve thought long and hard what to do with you once we brought you in, Arthur. Had a few folks here think we should put an end to you the quick way,” said as he rested his hand pointedly on one of the pistols at his hip, “and I’ll admit, I was tempted. But then I thought, here’s one, singular Agent acting, far as I can tell, on his lonesome. And what’s more, though they’ve started giving us a lot of trouble, we’ve never taken the time to get to know them.”

Realization dawned swiftly after that. 

Impressively, he didn’t start begging for his life. 

“You folk are into torture now?” Sadie asked Abigail at a whisper. “Know you like to play at being close to dirt, but I thought that was a step below you.”

 _It is_ , Abigail thought, but that apparently wasn’t true. She looked to John, standing across the way next to Hosea. Never one to hide his emotions from his face, John’s expression was as startled as she felt. Compared to him, Hosea more resembled a statue.

(Mostly, relief she’d sent Jack away swelled in her.)

“What else is he supposed to do?” She asked Sadie, instead.

“I guess,” Sadie returned, not sounding convinced at all.

By the tent, Bill proved they weren’t the only ones startled by the implication. He asked, confused (which, in typical Bill fashion, meant a touch of irritation, as if he were sure Dutch was going to make fun of him for his question), “We’re keeping him?” 

“For now. Until we have what we need to keep ourselves safe, and ensure it stays that way.” 

Bill hesitated, then nodded. Javier, next to him, didn’t look so surprised. 

Then Dutch looked around his gathered people. Abigail frowned when his eyes reached hers, but kept her mouth shut.

“I’m going to save you a heap of trouble,” Arthur grit out, drawing Dutch’s attention back, “and tell you, all they’ve got right now is what damage you’ve left. They don’t know nothing about where you’re going or why you’re going there. That’s the reason - the _only_ reason - they bothered with the likes of me.”

Dutch, cold: “And what were you to them, exactly?”

“A washed up, small time outlaw on his last legs.” He coughed again, around a bubbling, huffing laugh. “Obviously didn’t do much better as any high-flaunting Agent. Though I’ll admit, it was nice getting paid without somebody’s blood spilling. Not _always_ , anyway.”

Dutch shook his head. 

Then stepped forward yet again, reaching out to put a hand on Arthur’s filthy hair. Arthur flinched, violently; Dutch tightened his grip, yanking his head back to keep their eyes locked.

Despite the intimidation, his voice was oddly soft as he asked, “What happened to you, boy?”

As a caught rabbit to a hawk, Arthur stared back at him.

For a bit, his mouth worked around nothing.

Finally, he managed to find what he wanted to say. Resignation soaked the words-- defeat, the sort Abigail had heard before only from the soon-dead.

“You left me, Dutch. That’s what happened.”

At that, Dutch dropped his hold as if burned. 

Bill scoffed, obviously thinking such a thing a natural happenstance between superior and inferior or, more likely, an outright lie. He shut up quick, though, at the stricken look on Dutch’s face.

They all did. A hush swept through them, all eyes on Dutch. 

He stared at Arthur a long moment. Almost too long.

But then, swift as it had left before, it returned: his anger, vicious and snarling.

“I did not leave you, boy. I’ve never left anybody behind, _never._ Not if there was a chance they could be found and brought home.” He looked around the crowd, his accusation turned suddenly on them. “We’re family. And I’ll protect my family, no matter the cost.”

“We know, Dutch,” Javier said, quiet. “We trust you.”

(He had a few signs of struggle too, Abigail realized. Some livid-red fingerprints around his neck. New holes nicking the sides of his nice jacket. Seemed Arthur didn’t go quietly in the least, unlike his run-ins with John.)

Bill echoed him. The rest of them shared glances, leaving those in close proximity to mitigate his temper.

It worked, enough. Which meant: he stared at Javier a moment, looking ready to argue and a bit frustrated Javier wouldn’t take him up on it. 

Then it disappeared again, that anger rushing back from wherever it’d broken out of. 

“I know… I know. You’re good people. You listen to what I say, and understand I mean every word.” When he looked at Arthur, he looked with such exhaustion, it seemed he’d aged fifteen years. He waved a tired hand at him, turning away. “Get this sack of shit tied up and kept quiet. I want patrols doubled and extended in case his friends come looking. We’ve a good thing going in Rhodes, people; I won’t let this washed up, two-bit outlaw ruin that for us.”

Sensing the action was over, a few folk started dispersing and returning to their work. Susan, as she went, didn’t so much as glance back at Arthur. Those, the hush was quick to leave; of the ones left watching - Abigail, John, Charles, to name a few - the silence lingered. 

They watched Dutch turn away from a man who claimed he’d been left, who didn’t mind the sincere idea of prolonged torture before dumping a body, whose temper rose and fell at the drop of a dime, and began to wonder.

“You want us to start working him over, boss?” Bill asked.

“Let him sweat in his own misery for a few days,” Dutch replied, dismissive, “to help loosen his tongue. Only thing I want is him not dying too soon.”

“Got it.”

“Betrayal should come easy to him at this point in his lackluster career, but I’d like to make sure before we send anybody to root out Pinkertons.”

“Smart thinking, Dutch.” This, from Micah, jolting from his place by Dutch’s tent to circle their prisoner. “I’ll help them secure the rat.”

“Thank you, Micah. And good work, Javier, Bill. With this, we might just be able to put the past behind us once and for all.”

“Tahiti’s not so far now,” Bill quipped.

A low chuckle, lacking though it was in humor. “That’s exactly my thinking.”

(None of them noted he’d changed his _thinking_ on Arthur three times throughout the discussion.)

Arthur, for his part, put up a token struggle at being manhandled to his feet. “Get your grubby paws off me,” he snarled, trying to shrug Bill off -- but he quickly stopped when Bill drove a boot into his stomach, focused as he became on catching his breath through wheezing. 

After that, they more dragged than walked him to the prison wagon they’d, for a reason Abigail couldn’t fathom, held on to. It had become storage for Pearson’s scrap meats, salts, lard jars and anything else he picked up or requested. They recruited folk into clearing it out quick, relocating the items to the mess wagon proper, before tossing Arthur in. He was still bound tight. 

They were being nice, Micah told him, by leaving him his tongue. 

Bill added that if he started yelling, interrupting folks’ work and sleep and such things, he’d find they weren’t so nice.

In response, Arthur spat another glob of red-tinged spit straight into Bill’s face.

(Micah forced Bill back after that, lest they seriously risk an as-of-yet unwanted death. Arthur was left alone.)

“Dutch,” Abigail caught Hosea saying at the back of Dutch’s tent after Arthur had been locked up and the camp pretended (for a night, at least) not to be interested in his story as related to Dutch, his voice low and urgent, “I-- I’m not sure a Pinkerton prisoner is what we need right now. We’re supposed to be lying low.”

“Are you doubting me now, too, Hosea?”

“No! I just think… We should talk about this.”

“I don’t see what’s left to talk about, old friend. We’d agreed that Pinkerton scum out there is not our Arthur.”

A silence.

The silence, again. The silence that made some of them wonder, _Had it always been like this?_

Hosea’s voice dropped even lower. Not something he wanted overheard, obviously, though the uncertain nature of his conversation remained clear. Not wanting to be caught eavesdropping _so_ obviously, Abigail gathered his skirts and made herself continue on to round up Jack from his fishing.

Later at the campfire, the glum mood repaired itself as Pinkertons didn’t flood their camp and not much else changed, aside from the extra body in the wagon and Pearson (who had returned from town riding sideways on his horse) complaining about things not being where they were supposed to be. 

In doing his part for repairing it, John asked, clearly trying to make light: “What about the dog? Was he there?”

Javier glanced askance to him, pausing in his shoe-shining. Flecks of blood clung to the leather, despite him brushing at it for the better part of the evening. “The coonhound?”

“Yeah. Loud, hyperactive thing.”

“Bill shot it.” At Karen’s _seriously?_ and John’s _damn_ , Javier shrugged one shoulder. “It tried taking a hunk out of his backside while he was tying Arthur up. Thing was still alive last we saw it, though I can’t imagine it getting far. Bill had caught it in the leg.”

“That why Bill’s got the shiner?”

“No, that was from when we jumped him outside the post office. The dog’s why I’ve got this new necklace.” With a gesture to the bruises around his neck. “Don’t think I’ve seen an angrier man since Dutch turned on those fellows in Blackwater.”

“He loved that dog,” John could say.

“It loved him. And I love breathing. Tragic, what love does to us.”

“Truer words never spoken,” Karen toasted with her beer. “You catch that, Mary-Beth? Better’n your romance books can do, I bet.”

“The good ones usually don’t include a dying dog,” Mary-Beth returned, a bit stiff.

“You’re more concerned about the dog than my neck?” Javier teased. “That’s cold.”

“I’m going to turn in,” Abigail said, mostly to John. It _was_ getting late, and she hadn’t been participating much in the conversation, anyway.

John said he’d see her to her tent. She told him to stay, but he was adamant.

And so the group bid them both good-night, Karen and Mary-Beth giving Abigail knowing looks as she and John took off together. 

He led her not to his or her tent, but out to the front, near the horses. Kieran, who had made himself scarce as gold and positive everybody who approached wanted to take a piece out of him, eyed their approach nervously from his bedroll by the scout fire. Anxiety had always been fond of him, but the recent spike went beyond the necessary.

John told him to _simmer down, O’Driscoll, we’re not lingering_ \-- he said he was no O’Driscoll, but settled down as bid, vibrating with apprehension though he was. 

True to John’s word, they passed on through. Headed along the camp’s outskirts. Slowly, too, like they were on a stroll; except, John wasn’t running his mouth.

It reached the point that Abigail felt the need to put her foot down and make one thing clear. 

“I’m not in the mood, John.”

“Mood for what?” He replied, that dolt.

“For whatever you’re playing at.” She wasn’t to be thrown off by his acting dumb. “I’d like to sleep sometime tonight, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“Thought you’d be curious.”

“About what? _You?_ No, I satisfied my curiousity long ago.”

“Wait, you think I was pulling you away to-- Jesus! _No._ I ain’t in the mood, neither.”

“Then what’re we doing, exactly?”

“If you’d pipe down--”

“John? Abigail?”

“-- Aw, shit. Uh. Hi, Charles.”

“Hello, Charles.”

“You two are,” the smallest pause, as Charles Smith stared at them from his seat upon a stool next to the prison wagon, “up late.”

 _And not in a bed somewhere,_ was the unspoken ending there. Thank goodness it was Charles, who had the sense not to say such things aloud, and not Sean or, god forbid, Micah.

“All John’s fault.” Abigail crossed her arms over her chest. “He wanted to show me something, I suppose, except he isn’t saying what.”

“You didn’t give me a chance to explain what,” John muttered at her, before clearing his throat and looking to Charles. Charles looked back, blank-faced. “I was. I mean, we was. I mean, I-- hadn’t realized you were on guard duty.”

“Micah wasn’t difficult to persuade to switch,” Charles said, dry. “He’s not so fond of work that doesn’t involve something blowing up.”

From inside the wagon came an equally dry chuckle. It hitched at the end on a wheezing inhale, the motion clearly sporting some degree of pain.

“ _That’s_ clear.” Quiet words, again from within the wagon. Charles’ head tilted toward it, a half-smile breaking up his careful neutrality. “Surprised he’s still got all his fingers attached, what with his prattling on about what he’s made dynamite do for him.”

Abigail did not want to be where she stood. At the same time, she-- sort of did.

She wanted to see the man, anyway. Just a peek, before she went to sleep. Without the crowd, without Dutch looming, without any threat to them besides what would come of them for locking him up.

“You’re sounding awfully cozy with the Pinkerton, Charles,” John said, though it wasn’t as much of an accusation as it should’ve been.

Charles gave the indistinct lump of shadow propped against the side of the wagon’s interior bench a good, long side-eying.

“Some Pinkerton.”

“That’s what Milton always said, too.” With a self-deprecating cheerfulness. “He was spitting mad when they gave me the papers that said I was one of them. Stopped me on my way out to tell me the Agency was slipping if they’d let in any roughneck who could throw a half-decent punch.”

“And?”

“I showed him my half-decent punch, to demonstrate why it weren’t so bad a quality to have. He didn’t bitch at me so much after that. Least, not to my face.”

“That’s one way to teach a man a lesson.”

“Only way, usually.”

“Unfortunate for those without any skill with half-decent punches.”

“That’s why they invented guns, y’see. To give the weak and frail a shot.”

“I was asking Morgan what he’d done with our horses,” Charles told John as they stopped hovering and stepped close enough to be in respectable conversational range. 

Closer, the indistinct lump resolved itself into their feared follower: he looked a fright, the mud and blood cleared from his face to show off how much of what was left to be one big bruise with a side of scabbing scrapes. Somebody -- most likely the one engaged in such easy back-and-forth with him -- had cut his restrictive bindings and re-tied his hands in front of him. The rope around his ankles, too, looked fresh and not near as tight as Bill and Javier had done them.

The rope that doubled as the cage’s makeshift lock after Pearson had lost the cage’s key for the fifth time, gotten pissed at it accidentally locking for the tenth time, and goaded John into shooting it open, that was tied tight. And by the hoarse note lacking from his voice, Charles must have shared with him some water.

All in all, not quite what Dutch had in mind in making him sweat it out. For a supposedly hated prisoner, it was a cushy set-up.

(Arthur looked like he knew it, too. After how he’d been dragged in, he’d have to be stupid not to.)

John hooked his thumbs in his belt loops, his chin twitching up. To Abigail, his discomfort over the situation being borderline friendly was clear. To others, he probably just looked like a prick. 

“He offer to give them back, or does his idea of possessions returning to their rightful owners only go so far as he being the rightful owner?”

“Can’t often say I’m a rightful owner of much,” Arthur sniffed, coughed, and spat, not as an insult but rather to clear his throat, “you just happened to keep taking what I got fair and square.”

“Right. I’m sure your gunslinger was real happy to give you his gun.”

“He sold them to MacFarlane,” Charles said, speaking over Arthur’s muttered _Boy Calloway was no gunslinger anyhow,_ “and said it likely they’d held onto them, good horses as they are.”

“And why’s he going and telling us something as helpful as that?” John asked.

Charles turned to Arthur. So did the other two not in the prison wagon.

Arthur’s eyes jumped between them, then settled somewhere over Abigail’s shoulder.

“Don’t mistake me for being nice. Way things stand,” he again cleared his throat, “it don’t matter much what I do and don’t tell. So I figure I might as well tell it all.” 

Somehow, Abigail didn’t think it was simple as that. Maybe he was a shit Pinkerton, but he was good at shit-stirring, as evidenced by him luring Jack away just to tell them his name, which in turn got Dutch and Hosea all up in arms about a ghost, which _definitely_ added to Dutch flying off the handle during their ferry job, which-- kept the snowball rolling until they’d near been buried under an avalanche.

Point was, Arthur Morgan wasn’t simple. 

But then, that very thought proved him right about them not trusting a word.

Abigail didn’t much like how he got under their skin while barely lifting a finger. The man had a gift for it, and it wasn’t going to do any of them any good.

Arthur, perhaps sensing her thoughts on the matter, briefly caught her eye. 

He dropped her gaze soon enough, however, and capped off his poor explanation with, “Well. Anyway. You lot can waste your time deciding what to make of it-- that don’t make any difference to me.”

“We won’t be letting you out of this,” John promised him. Abigail wondered if it sounded like a bluff to anybody else’s ears, or if she were being too hard on him again (not that she was often _too_ wrong about him). “If this is all to sweet-talk us or get Dutch off your back, you’d better think again.”

Arthur shook his head. “If I expected that I’d be walking from this, I wouldn’t be so _say-vu_.”

“C’est la vie,” Charles corrected.

A frown. “C’est la vie.” A beat. “Really? Thought it were say-vu.”

“You speak French?”

“No.”

“Neither do I. But I know the phrase isn’t c’est vous.”

“Huh.”

“What’s any of it?” Abigail asked, since John wouldn’t despite looking as lost as she was.

“It means, _you’re fucked and there’s nothing you can do about it, so don’t get too excited._ ”

“I’ll have to remember that. Feels more relevant with each passing day.”

John scuffed his boot through the dirt. He wasn’t as impressed. “Handy phrase, sure. They really pack all that into three little words?”

“The French are more resourceful than you’d figure.”

“Sounds like that’s got another story attached to it. You’re as bad as an old man, always itching to tell us about somebody strange you’ve happened on when the person probably never existed in the first place.”

Arthur blew a breath out and leveled him with a flat look. “Not my fault people don’t like talking to you. Can’t imagine why. You’re charming as dysentery at a house party.”

Amused, Charles glanced away. 

Very amused, especially at how riled John got over the comment, Abigail elbowed him in the side and said, “Relax. When was the last time we was invited to a house party?”

“Heard about what happened to Copper.” 

The easy air shattered. 

Abigail elbowed him harder, giving him a scowl for ruining their talking with his volatile ego and its big mouth. 

John wasn’t cruel, though, no matter how often he tried to be. Maybe he’d meant the comment meanly, but the second Arthur’s expression shuttered and his shoulders stiffened, John’s vindictive expression broke into wary contrition.

He offered lamely as Charles and Abigail glared at him, “... Heard he gave Bill a good fight.”

“Didn’t save him.” Arthur picked at a loose thread in his pant’s side seam. “Wish he’d gotten a better hold before they shot him.”

“I’m sorry.” Charles. Not contrite, not sympathetic, not mean. Just plain and honest.

Arthur shrugged one shoulder-- then, just like that, snapped out of his morose thoughts and into what Abigail had expected on coming by the wagon. His eyes narrowed accusingly at Charles, his lip curled disdainfully. “What for? Whose side are you on, Charlie?”

Charles didn’t back down. “He was a good dog. Rescued me and John. And Hosea, of course.”

Growling unintelligible words into his jacket’s lapel, Arthur shrugged his shoulders again, rough, and turned as well as he could away from them. He couldn’t go far, unless he fancied falling on his face.

Abigail caught him saying, “Stupid Copper. Thought the whole world was his friend.”

John cleared his throat. Abigail gave him a warning look and quiet, “Think good and hard, John, before you open your mouth.”

Brushing her off, he said to Arthur: “You know. Jack wouldn’t stop asking for a dog after meeting yours. Was real annoying about it.”

Abigail scoffed, her good humor not as far from her as she’d expected. “Don’t pretend you had any hand in fetching Cain. That dog showed up of its own free will and only stayed because Jack wouldn’t quit feeding it.”

“Smart dog.” Charles, also lighter in tone.

“‘Bout as smart as us,” John said, “seeing as showing up and being fed despite everyone’s better judgment is why most of us stuck around, too.”

“Some of us had loftier dreams in joining,” Abigail said.

“Yeah? How’re those working out for you?”

A sniff. “They’re a work in progress, John.” 

“Might work better without the deadweight.” From Arthur, who unburied himself from his jacket. Wouldn’t look up from his boots and was lukewarm at best toward them, but the edge of his bitterness over Copper had dulled. 

More likely he’d bottled it up and shoved it down deep. No point blaming him for that.

“Yeah,” John shot back, throwing his hands up, “like a Pinkerton who’s got no good information to give, for starters.”

“I’ll be out of your hair soon enough.” Plainly stated. Kieran had no reason to worry about backsliding into being treated like Arthur, Abigail thought; his constant begging and pleading been nothing like Arthur, for all the good and bad it had done him and would do Arthur. “Tragic thing is, you won’t be out of mine sooner.”

Though a bleak thing to joke about, she had to fight down her smile.

And that was when the realization hit her.

It staggered her. Took her from the moment, from John’s responding jab and Charles’ quietly amused teasing poorly disguised as mediation, from Arthur’s stark resignation over his own impending, most likely painful death-- and put her back to the beginning of the evening, when Hosea had attempted to talk Dutch out of keeping Morgan locked up.

Having Arthur Morgan caught and caged wasn’t going to go well, but not for the reason Hosea thought.

A fissure ran through the camp. She hadn’t seen it because she hadn’t wanted to, but she could now. It hadn’t been well defined; it had no clear instigator; but it wormed its way through their lives all the same since their string of bad luck resulted in more deaths and losses than ever before, and Arthur _you left me_ Morgan had set himself up nicely as the hammer poised over the nail, ready to split them wide open and show just how far the rot went.

Later, when Uncle and Sean at last returned from Rhodes and stumbled drunkenly to investigate what in the _world_ had happened while they were gone and who the _fuck_ was the ugly sucker stuck in the cage (-- “Ain’t that Kieran?” - “No, you drunk bastard, he’s too brawny to be Kieran!” --), Abigail slipped away to her tent. Miraculously, no one accosted her on why she and John had spent so much time talking by the wagon, though she knew it wasn’t likely their dallying had gone unnoticed by somebody. 

Charles’ pampering wouldn’t go unnoticed either, she thought. Arthur had best enjoy how good he had it before his guard was permanently switched out.

(Not that he’d have long-- oh, but that was a terrible thought, and not well-suited for before bedtime.)

Jack didn’t stir at her arrival. Where he kept vigil over the boy, Cain lifted his head and softly thumped his tail in greeting. Abigail leaned over her boy to give him a scratch behind the ears, pushing away her own nerves and dread over may-or-may-not-happen troubles.

Off-hand, she wondered if John had the same apprehension. And, if he did, if he’d realized what exactly it was about. And, if he’d realized, if he’d be willing to do anything about it.

All he’d known - and all she’d known to be good after her being run out of her own home and left on the streets - was the van der Linde gang. What would become of him and her without them was difficult to fathom.

A fissure didn’t have to be the end, she thought. They could patch it up. Hope wasn’t _gone,_ nowhere close.

 

. . .

 

All the same, she kept an eye on their camp lockbox. On what money went in there, and what Dutch squirreled away for so-called safekeeping. 

And, from what she noticed, she kept an eye on the key that led to the much bigger payout.

 

. . .

 

“Fetch the salts, Mrs. Adler. Darn the socks, Mrs. Adler. Hey, Mrs. Adler, have you fed the chickens yet? No? Go do that, then water the prisoner, Mrs. Adler.” 

Water sloshed over the bucket’s edge as she heaved it from the lake. Sand and dirt and other lake-things swirled and settled at the bottom. She ignored it, hauling it up the hill and through camp while continuing her under-the-breath cussing.

“No, I won’t say thank you, Mrs. Adler, because this is work you were born to do, on account of your lady-bits. _Fuck_ you very much, Pearson, you ungrateful slob… Hey! Williamson!”

Bill startled into wakefulness at her yell, scrambling to sit up straight and look as if he hadn’t been sleeping on guard duty. He tipped near clean off the tiny stool before righting himself, rubbing the back of his hand across his nose, and smacking his lips. Waking up, in as disgusting a way as the water in her bucket looked.

“Mrs. Adler,” he greeted her, blinking rapidly as his eyes adjusted to bright noon light. “That time already? Hey, you gonna be long?”

She squinted at him, dropping the bucket next to the prison wagon. “Why?”

“If you could watch him a bit, I’m going to grab lunch.”

“Was just gonna to toss this in and see what he catches,” she said, mostly to irritate him rather than any thought for the Pinkerton, “which ain’t gonna take long.”

“Great.” He slapped his hands on his knees and pushed himself up. Didn’t even look at her as he trooped off to the stew pot, waving his hand dismissively at her as he went. “Don’t leave him alone, Dutch’ll get mad. I’ll be back when I’m done.”

“I didn’t say _yes_ , asshole,” Sadie called after him, but he was already gone.

She muttered dark things about Williamson too, then. How he thought just cause he was an alright shot, he didn’t have to do anything substantive. How he was a mean brute with a chip on his shoulder and probably mommy issues, and his only saving grace was that Micah was worse.

Then she finally got around to what she’d come over for. Turned to the prison wagon, leaning in to get a look at their famed prisoner. 

She whistled at what she saw. Fanned her hand in front of her nose at what rot she smelled. “Ooh, boy. You alive in there?”

Arthur Morgan didn’t reply. She saw his eyelids flutter open and his eyebrows and nose scrunch, his head lifting an inch from the floor to let him get a better look at her. But that was it in ways of acknowledgement, and soon enough, his head was back on the floor and his eyes squeezed shut.

“Got you some water. Been, what, three days? Reckon you’d like some.”

He got a little life in him then, shifting around like he wanted to get up. Unfortunately for him, his legs and arms were still bound, and his hands--- 

Sadie avoided looking at the pulpy mess that was his hands.

He hissed and rolled to his back when he apparently forgot the pulpy mess that was his hands, too, and tried to set them against the floor to push him up. 

Maybe the sight pulled something in her deadened chest. Maybe she just didn’t want to think too much about if her watching him struggle without helping meant she was participating in the violence against him. Maybe she plain didn’t want to know whether or not she _actually_ cared, because she was pretty sure she didn’t, but that emptiness was a horrible thing to look at dead-on, and-- anyway, it was sad, watching a man die like he was dying.

So she started working on the door’s rope, figuring he was too weak to do much damage if she opened the door and gave him the bucket instead of just pouring it on him. Said, “Easy now, big guy. Listen, I was joking about the dosing you thing, though you do smell like you need a bath mighty bad.” 

Five days since he’d shown up. Three since Micah and Bill started sweating him. No food since his arrival, and no water since the torture began. 

And Dutch could try to dress it up. He could try to tell her it was a _prolonged questioning_ and _unique circumstances_ , but all he was doing was putting a dress on a pig and calling it a lady. Dress or no, it was a pig. In the same way, what they did to Morgan was torture. 

Hell, they was breaking his fingers and sticking knives into his mouth to make his gums bleed. They was torturing him. Just cause they did it off site and away from everybody’s eyes and ears didn’t change the damage anybody could see when they dragged him back in.

Nobody else much liked to hear that, though, to the point that Dutch took her aside and told her that if she insisted on spreading disparaging rumors, she’d be on latrine duty for a month. After that, though she grumbled, she kept her thoughts to herself. 

“Don’t imagine telling you what they’re doing to you is bad, though,” she said aloud as the rope finally started coming undone, “so, just so you’re aware, I’m aware. They’re torturing you, plain and simple.”

“That right?” He said back, though his hard _t’s_ dropped and the rest sounded more breath than word. 

It was also a bit amused.

“Strange bastard, ain’t you? Thinking I’m being funny when I’m telling you about you being cut up for some sick fucks’ entertainment.” 

She pulled the rope full off and opened the door. The hinges squeaked horribly. Rather than even attempt to push her out of the way and get out, he flinched, curling in to himself best he could, like he was expecting a blow. She figured that fit her expectations. 

“Not sure anybody deserves what they’re doing to you. Me, I prefer clean killing. One bullet per man. Right through the skull. Even--- even the worst man I can think of, all I’d want to do different is put a bullet in his belly.”

As she spoke and didn’t hit him, as she hauled the bucket up to set on the wagon floor, he uncurled a little and opened his eyes enough to squint at her. 

Said, in a mix of confusion and interest, voice a rasp, “Water?” 

“Yep. Guess Dutch meant it when he said he wanted you around a while longer. This’s all yours.”

He shuffled himself to his side, and then, gingerly, to his elbows and knees. Crawled forward like that, and then, before she could say otherwise, practically dunked his head into the bucket, taking big gulps. 

“Careful,” she said, rushing to right it before it spilled anyway. “Not sure how long this’s supposed to last you.”

That didn’t deter him much. Half of the bucket splashed onto the floor or down his gullet (probably more the floor) before he pulled back and rolled, panting, to his side. 

“Thirsty, huh,” she commented, idle. 

Catching her sardonic tone, he huffed a not-funny laugh at her.

She closed the door, then, as he regained his bearings. Tied the rope tight and knotted it thrice, with a fancy little knot she knew Micah would struggle to undo. It wouldn’t stave off any misery for Morgan and might even made his fun sessions worse, but it’d amuse her to see the creepy son of a bitch cursing and fighting with a bit of tweed. 

“Why’re you here?” 

“What?” She blinked at Morgan, who’d somewhat regained his breath and was looking at her straight-on. Well. Almost straight-on. Fog clouded his eyes, making the blue wander when she knew he didn’t mean to.

“Sounds like you don’t like it.”

“Don’t.” She stepped back, surveying her handiwork rather than look at him. “But it’s a sight better than where you are.”

He gave another miserable little breath of a laugh. “That ain’t hard, miss.”

“ _Missus_ ,” she corrected, sharp.

“Missus.” His eyes wandered downward, where her hand would be if the wagon floor didn’t obstruct his view. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine.”

“Who’s the mister?”

“Nobody here.”

He hummed, a little fake-interested note. Eyes moved back to the sky. His hands, he kept gingerly cradled to his chest.

She eyed him. 

Really, she couldn’t figure out what had Dutch so pissed at him. The Pinkertons were horrible folks, sure, with nasty jobs that hurt the many. But, far as she saw it, the O’Driscoll was worse by association.

Kieran O’Driscoll hadn’t gotten worked over like Arthur Morgan, though.

“What is it about you?” She demanded, unhappy with the mystery and more than glad to take out her building frustrations over the camp on this fellow that nobody listened to. When he looked at her questioningly, she clarified, “Dutch don’t normally do this. You really set him off.”

“Lucky me.”

“Yeah, lucky you. So, what’d you do?”

“Left. I guess.”

“‘Cept you say you was left behind.”

“That’s how I see it. Not how he sees it.” He got his breathing under control, his eyes slipping shut. Like that, if she just focused on the rise-and-fall of his chest and not his face or hands or anything else, he almost looked peaceful. “How I see it, obviously, don’t carry as much weight.”

Obviously.

She pointed out, as if he’d forgotten, “You was hunting us.”

“You _was_ being easy to hunt.”

At that, she cracked a smile. “I suppose. Wasn’t around back then.”

“Yeah?” He didn’t seem too interested. 

She didn’t much care. “Dutch helped me when nobody else would. That ain’t easy to forget.”

He snorted. Derisive.

She demanded, feeling like a dog that’d just gotten a bone, “What?”

“Nothing.”

“No, you got something to say. Say it.”

“That’s how he got me. Helped me out when nobody else would.” A slow breath in. A slower breath out. “Now look at me.”

“I ain’t racing off to become a Pinkerton any time soon.”

“I ain’t telling you what to do,” he said, sounding all at once exhausted to the bone, like he’d dug himself five feet under and was ready to lay down and call it quits, “I’m just answering you what you asked.”

He was. She knew it, plain and simple.

The simplicity made a bit of her mad. It sounded patronizing. It echoed Pearson, and Williamson, and every other godforsaken man in camp that wasn’t worth half her Jakey. 

It also told her why Williamson and Micah went as far as they did with him and weren’t satisfied with whatever answers he gave them. That thought, more than anything, soothed her live-wire nerves. 

“How’d he leave you, anyway?” She asked, eventually. Half thought he’d fallen asleep with how still he’d gotten.

But he hadn’t, despite how much he probably wished he had. “I got caught. My fault, I’d been stupid and young and too greedy for my own good. Sat in jail for a while. Then, when they was transporting me to a boat that’d take me to a tropical hell, I saw him. He sat on his horse and watched them cart me off. Didn’t wave, didn’t shout, didn’t do… nothing.”

“He said he’d talked to you. That it was what you wanted to do.”

“I know what he said.” There, finally. Bitterness. “Know now, anyway. I’d spend whole nights wondering why. Now I know-- he just _thought_ I wanted to leave.”

“Did he?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. Don’t matter.” Those eyes opened, a big breath taken. “What’s done is done. The Pinkertons got me, and now, here I am.”

She went quiet for a long moment. Chewed that over. 

“You really didn’t tell them anything,” she said, slow, “did you.”

He barked a laugh. It hurt him, made something in his chest not sit right, or pinch wrong; he doubled over in a coughing fit from it, his breathing a wheeze afterward. 

“What was I gonna tell?” He managed between gasps. “I’d been gone ten-some years. All I knew was what names to look for, and the Pinkertons already had that.”

“They was just that easy to hunt,” she echoed him.

He laughed again. A sick, wet laugh that lacked any trace of humor, one that kept his coughing going. The force of it made him roll over eventually, onto his stomach-- where his wheezing turned painful, his forehead pressed tight into the disgusting, blood-and-lake-water-and-other-bodily-fluids covered floor.

“Some folk don’t know when to quit,” he told her, “and others, they can’t quit. Think me and them are some of the latter. What they’ve got, though, this camp, this camaraderie - that’s the best you can hope for with a life like this.”

Wasn’t that the truth. 

Except, apparently, they’d decided to start resembling the O’Driscolls. Torturing folk who didn’t need it. Feeding folk who didn’t need it. Keeping on with folk better left alone, like Micah and Strauss.

“Hey!”

She startled. Looked behind her as Williamson stomped up, his lunch evidently finished. 

He accused, “Thought you was going to throw him water, not give him a bucket and some laughs.” 

She turned fully, standing her ground. 

“What’s that, Williamson? You afraid of a bucket?” 

“Now, I didn’t say that,” he growled, stopping in front of her.

“Well, that’s what I heard.” She jabbed him, hard, in the chest. He tipped back with it, rocking onto his heels. “Dutch wants him alive. Won’t be alive much longer without some water, will he?”

“But the bucket--”

“Now you and me don’t have to see each other for a few more days while he finishes that off. Everybody wins, Williamson. Don’t be a baby about it.”

He didn’t look convinced-- in fact, seemed quite ticked about being told what to do by _her_ -, but he stopped arguing about the damn bucket.

Told her that Pearson was looking for her, though, which she didn’t hide her disgust over. 

Arthur had collapsed back onto his side, half-curled and watching their exchange with vague, dazed curiousity. All her talking to him and his laughing must’ve taken it out of him.

Sorry bastard, she thought. 

She said, not thinking much of it, “How about you go help Pearson and I’ll keep watch over our big, bad prisoner?”

Williamson guffawed. “Pearson don’t want my help. He wants yours.”

“Figures. Was worth a try,” she muttered, her temper rising yet again. If she didn’t get out from under Pearson’s thumb, she was pretty sure she’d put one of his cleavers into his thick head. “Fine. Treat him nice, Morgan; he’s a sensitive soul, our Bill.”

“Will do,” Morgan croaked, proving he had a better sense of humor than most in even the worst of circumstances. “Don’t cause too much trouble, Mrs. Adler.”

“You should know I won’t. I’m an angel.”

Williamson sputtered an insult back at her and then at him, but by then, she’d left to see what Pearrson could possibly want. 

If she gave Kieran a threatening snarl that she hyped up more than she needed to (it sent him skittering all the same; whatever others thought, she was happy Morgan’s situation reminded him that he’d gotten off _easy_ ) and then planned herself a chance to get to Rhodes and invest in proper clothes and weaponry with whatever money she could get her hands on, well. That wasn’t nobody’s business but her own.

Her interaction with Morgan, however, didn’t go unnoticed. She found herself approached by Smith within the evening. He asked her simple questions about Morgan-- how he was, if he’d threatened her, what he’d said. 

She answered simply, too. He looked on his last legs. No, he hadn’t threatened her. No, she didn’t think he had any worse sin under his belt than the rest of them.

It wasn’t until Hosea Matthews pulled her over to ask much the same questions that she started wondering if something was up that she’d missed. She couldn’t very well ask Hosea, though, at least not point-blank. The man had a mind of a fox, and saw anything simplistic as a trap waiting to spring around him. 

Unfortunately, if she had anything to think of his talking to her besides him being vaguely interested in Morgan’s progress, she couldn’t figure it out on account of his roundabout approach. 

She went to bed dreaming about pants and a proper gun on her hip, and no more feeding the chickens without thanks or fetching water for tortured prisoners.

If she thought some on what Morgan had to say about Dutch doing the same to him as her and then leaving him when it became inconvenient to save him--- that wasn’t anybody’s business but her. 

If Jake could only see her now, she thought. He’d be impressed at her planning, but sad that she had to. 

But then, Jake was dead.

(And that thought was why she didn’t sleep a wink, and was up in a flash when their lowly prisoner started yelling his head off.)

 

. . .

 

Despite everyone saying he was lying, Lenny really did enjoy night patrol. 

The woods were often quiet and peaceful, save the occasional owl and rustling raccoon. It gave him time to think over whatever catastrophe his friends dragged up during the day, and the space to do so without Sean or Karen ribbing him over _playing scholar._ Although often tempted, he never actually pulled out a lantern to read-- because it was also _critical_ work, what with most thievery happening in the wee hours of the morning. 

Also, since everyone else hated it, he got a lot of respect and _oh, no, Lenny, you grab first bite of the morning mash, you deserve it_ -esque perks for consistently pulling night patrol. That was nice, too.

If only the camp could be quieter while he tried to sleep through the daylight hours, it would’ve been a perfect set up.

Nobody had gotten through on his watch. 

Far as he knew, anyway.

Maybe that made him a little complacent. Certainly, Micah seemed to think so. But then, Micah thought a lot of things, most of which were absolute trash and meaningless besides, so Lenny didn’t let one blowhard’s errant teasing get to him.

Maybe he started taking for granted that Rhodes had thus far been a quiet, easy town. He kept his eyes peeled for Raiders, sure, half-positive they’d been spotted mingling the races on the roads, in the town and in camp and would gallop in to pick a fight over it (even though Sean thought him paranoid and only Tilly _really_ agreed and understood). But the Raiders, they were a noisy bunch. They wouldn’t ride up on the camp without at least a dozen torches, which would’ve been easy to spot in the dark.

Maybe Sadie’s yelling at Pearson and then Susan yelling at Mary-Beth for slacking and then the Reverand yelling about who-knew-what had woken him up too much through the day, and he was unnaturally tired for it, and thus slipped up.

Maybe he was just one person, and he’d been on the wrong side of camp.

There were a lot of _maybes_ and not a lot the reason mattered, because whatever the reason, it happened. Folk sneaked through his patrol line and set their greedy talons on their youngest camp member. 

And Lenny wouldn’t have caught a whiff of the operation if not for Arthur Morgan yelling his throat raw.

“Hey! _Hey!_ Wake up, you stupid bastards-- he’s got Jack!”

A gun fired. A man - possibly Arthur - shouted in surprise, then life-ending pain.

Another two shots. Other people started shouting, too, the camp rousing itself to wakefulness with the speed of those that lived a life sleeping light.

Heart in his throat, Lenny hoisted his shotgun and took off like a shot toward the altercation. 

It came from half-way into the woods, he discovered; there, Arthur straddled a grey-jacketed, heavily bearded man, a knife clasped between his freed hands. The man had a pistol, but dropped it to scrabble at his neck with a gurgling scream as Arthur plunged his knife into the side of his neck.

Behind them, another man raised a machete, growled, “You lying son of a bitch,” rushed Arthur’s hunched form-- and fell, sideways, as Lenny unloaded buckshot into him. 

“Nice shot,” Arthur told him, looking wide-eyed over his shoulder as the man collapsed near on top of him.

“Thanks,” Lenny said, without thinking about it. 

Then he thought about it. And he aimed his shotgun at Arthur, hardening himself for the fight sure to come.

Except it didn’t. Because Arthur looked down the barrel of his gun, raised his blood-covered hands in a placating gesture (knife held awkwardly in one, like he couldn’t close his hand right), and cussed at him, saying, “Fucking hell, kid, don’t waste our goddamned time. Those hyenas are getting away with Jack.”

“Jack?” Lenny repeated, feeling dumb and deaf.

Arthur pointed to the forest. 

Past the blood rushing his ears from Arthur’s and his murders, he heard it: men, running away through the night. 

“Don’t know if they have horses, but if they do, they’re gonna leave you choking on their dust if you keep lingering.” Arthur struggled to his feet as he spoke, wobbling all the way like a newborn fawn. 

Lenny vaguely remembered seeing he’d been kept tied up the days he’d been kept in camp. Truth told, he hadn’t wanted to know anything about Arthur Morgan until he was good and gone. Call him a coward, but it let his conscience rest easier.

“What are you waiting for?” Arthur barked at him, sudden and harsh. 

“I-- I-” Lenny stuttered, caught between watching their prisoner and running after Jack.

Arthur snarled, “Go!” and behind him, lantern-light shined through the trees. Lenny caught sight of Sadie’s face, and knew Sadie saw him, too. Knew Arthur’d be easier to catch than Jack, probably, and that he was right about the horses.

Lenny’d already messed up in letting the kidnappers through. No way could he also let them escape with their prey.

So he lamely told Arthur, “Stay here,” and then took off after the men who thought they could waltz in and out with _their_ kid.

Behind him, he heard Arthur not heed his advice and take off, too, sideways from Lenny’s trajectory.

That was out of his hands. It’d never even been in his hands.

Of those in the camp, Lenny had a better run time than most. He learned quickly he had a _much_ better run time than the kidnappers, and that while they did have horses, the horses weren’t so fond of bullets in their flanks.

Miraculously, Jack clung to the rearing, screaming horse when its main rider fell. As the horse sped off in a fright, Hosea - appearing beside him still in his nightclothes - put a bullet between the rider’s eyes.

“Get a move on after him, Lenny!” Hosea told him, taking cover behind a tree at the last rider’s return fire. Bark bits flew where his head would’ve been.

Lenny, ducking beside him, had to first warn: “Morgan’s—“

“You leave Morgan and clean up to us. Go bring Jack home.”

“Right!”

The other horse and rider spun around, gunshots breaking the night’s peace as he decided to stand and fight rather than go after his query.

Trusting Hosea to have his back, Lenny ignored him in favor of the panicked horse bolting swiftly out of view.

For what felt like the next hour but probably wasn’t, Lenny raced across the countryside trying to calm the horse enough for him to pluck the boy off without getting kicked. He managed eventually, the horse running itself to a thick patch of trees and being startled into stopping by the wild boars that raced, screaming, past it. It pranced nervously on the spot as Lenny, panting, approached it, shushing it in between telling the sobbing, terrified Jack that everything was going to be just fine.

They’d tied a gag around him, which Lenny had to help him get off after he’d lifted him off the horse. When he did, Jack clung to him with a surprisingly strong grip for a six-year-old. 

Any attempt by Lenny to set the boy down or put them both on the horse resulted in him wailing louder. That, plus Lenny leading the horse back, too (both to spite the rider’s ghost and to sell off to their new, rednecked sibling contacts), was why the trek back to camp took long enough that dawn’s early light heralded their return. 

Boon of boons, he returned to a lively, very awake camp. 

Abigail’s pissed off, near-yell voice tipped him off to such. The bigger surprise was when Lenny realized she was chewing out _Dutch._

“He’s the reason Jack wasn’t kidnapped from right under our noses! Let him breathe a moment.”

“And where is the boy you keep harping on about him saving? Wasn’t the boy’s hide he ran off to save. See reason, woman. He’s playing you, like he’s been playing all of us.”

“Can’t blame a man for taking an opportunity to slip his noose. Lord knows more than a few in this camp have done the same.”

“You saying we’re bad as the law? That it ain’t a noose he deserves?”

“I wasn’t saying we’re anything like the law, you know that, but I am saying that, yes, after tonight, I insist he deserves a re-evaluation.”

“You _insist._ ” 

Dangerous. The same tone as his dad took when Lenny complained one minute too long about not being able to go out for the evening like every other boy he knew; the last warning before the belt. 

Just as Lenny contemplated dropping Jack and turning around to finish up his patrol in the safety of the woods, though, Kieran - ever at the group’s edges - spotted him and lit up. He nudged Mary-Beth, who looked over and lit up twice as bright.

“Lenny’s back! And he’s got Jack!”

Jack, who felt closer to two hundred pounds after the long walk. Lenny was happy to put him down. Thankfully, Jack was happy to be set down, as he spotted his mother through the camp crowd and couldn’t wait to run and bury his face in her skirts with a tear-stricken _mom!_

She met him half-way, dropping to a knee to scoop him up and hold him tight.

John broke off from the crowd to go to their sides, too. He hovered, less awkward than openly relieved, though he didn’t seem to know what to do besides tossle the kid’s hair and welcome him back with a voice that he’d later swear hadn’t been choked up.

Sean met Lenny with a congratulatory pat-smack on the back, a welcome so strong Lenny stumbled before catching himself.

“Can’t believe I’m friends with a true hero,” Sean crowed. “Rescuing tykes. Downing baddies. Lenny, watch yourself, or you’re going to be too good for the likes of us.”

“What a boring life that’d be. I’d never,” Lenny assured him, caught up enough in the excitement that he didn’t let himself linger on the strain at the edge of Sean’s expression.

Tension fizzled across the group, though all were heartened at Jack’s safe return. It took Lenny a moment to figure out why the cheer was so forced until he’d made his way toward the group’s front and spotted the man, head bowed and wrists again lashed behind his back, kneeling before Dutch’s tent. 

Micah had a hand on his shoulder, but he didn’t look too concerned about Arthur, beat up as he was, bolting.

 _Dutch._ He stepped neatly down and around Arthur Morgan, his people parting like water around him as he clapped Lenny on the shoulders and gave him a wide grin. 

“Mr. Summers! Thank you for safely retrieving the boy. Truly brave of you, son.”

Lenny couldn’t help smiling back, the camp tension farther away under Dutch’s praise. “Anybody would’ve done the same.”

“Regardless, you did it perfectly. A job so well done deserves some reward.”

“I had some help,” he admitted, unable to shoulder all the praise while facing Arthur’s hunched form. In the morning light, he realized why he’d held the knife like he’d wanted to drop it-- his fingers were all messed up, a myriad of deep red and purple and sickly green. Broken bones, left to heal wrong, if they were supposed to heal at all. 

“You had help, you say?” Dutch’s smile faded inch by inch, one of his hands dropping from Lenny’s shoulder while the other tightened. Lenny, caught up on Arthur, saw its end result: a scrutinizing look, like Dutch was looking for something from him. “And who was that?”

“Morgan,” Lenny answered. It was the truth, which he spoke fine without fear. Nonetheless, it highlighting how he’d messed up his job _that badly_ felt horrible. “He was the one to alert the camp about them being there. I’d… I must’ve missed them sneaking through. I’m sorry, I’d failed, that was my fault, they were-- they must’ve been real quiet, or at least knew what they were doing. I wasn’t sleeping or anything, I swear it.”

“It’s okay. I believe you were doing your duty. We all falter.” 

Lenny nodded, encouraged and hopeful and, most of all, grateful for the understanding. Dutch gave him a tight smile, relaxed his grip on his arm. Clapped his hand there once more, then backed up. 

“They knew what they were doing. That much was clear.”

“They introduced themselves as Braithwaites. Said they had a debt to pay with your boy.”

Every line in Dutch went tense.

Unconsciously, Lenny echoed it. Around him, he felt the camp do the same, all of them fine-tuned to Dutch’s moods. 

All froze at Arthur's plain statement except Abigail, Jack in her arms, half-pushing her way back toward the group’s center. John trailed her, looking more unsure but not willing to let her make her case alone.

Micah cuffed Arthur over the head. “Be quiet, rat. This don’t involve you.”

“Think it very much involves me, _cowpoke_ , seeing as you’re all deciding if you want to lynch me,” Arthur replied, voice starting darkly cheery and ending in a biting snarl.

Micah went to strike him again-- but stopped, hand immediately going up and open-palmed as Dutch said, “Hold on. Let him speak.”

Abigail stopped her advancing, too. She’d planted herself right back by Arthur, on the side opposite Micah. She’d looked ready to give Micah or Dutch or anyone else who so much as breathed wrong in her direction an earful-- except Arthur, apparently, as she stayed quiet for him speaking.

“You say those men were the Braithwaites?”

“Those men said they was the Braithwaites. I don’t know no Braithwaites aside from what I overheard folk talk about, here and in Rhodes,” -- Dutch looked around camp, but didn’t muster up irritation at any of them, as what were they supposed to do? Not talk about their days in camp? -- “but unless you’ve another group of inbred, genteel southerners looking to steal a kid off you, don’t see why they wouldn’t be who they said they was.”

“They dressed themselves like Grays.” 

Hosea. He hadn’t changed out of his nightclothes. To be fair, Lenny realized as he looked around, _most_ hadn’t changed out of their nightclothes. Most rubbed at blurry eye with the adrenaline worn off; a few yawned; all looked like they’d really like this business wrapped up so they could go back to sleep, get started on work, or-- _probably_ \- go back to uneasily ignoring Arthur Morgan’s tortured existence.

Arthur lifted his head enough to look back at Hosea. With one eye swollen shut, it took some doing.

“You tangled yourself between the Grays and Braithwaites _intentionally_?”

“It was a gamble,” Hosea said, “one that is becoming clear won’t pay off. We’re better cutting our losses now and getting out of here.”

“The only thing worth staying for is that gold.” John. A few nodded in agreement with him.

“I reckon there’s no gold. I, no, I don’t just reckon, I--”

“Hosea,” Dutch started, “you hadn’t told me--”

“-- I _know_ there’s no gold, and-- I had told you, Dutch! I told you this was a gamble we were better off not taking. I told you getting involved in this blood feud would do us harm, and it nearly has. Unless you’d rather wait until the boy’s been dragged off for good before admitting so?”

“No.” Stiff. “You know I don’t want that. But, the boy’s fine. They’d have to be stupider than they are to try the same trick twice.”

“We keep assuming they’re simple, but if we stick around, I reckon they’ll start playing _us_. Hell, Dutch, they were willing to target a child.”

Dutch took a deep breath. In the crowd gathered, a few exchanged uncertain glances. 

“That’s true. That’s… very true. A child. A little boy. That ain’t right.” 

“There’s no gold?” From Abigail. She set Jack down, though he clung to her skirts and stared most at Arthur, wide-eyed. “Then what are we doing here? They know where we are. We should leave.”

“If there’s really no gold,” from John, “and it’s only a matter of time before they come around again, we-- yeah. What are we waiting for?”

And just like that, everyone woke up enough to put in their two cents on what they should or should not do. It became such a cacophony so quickly, Lenny could hardly keep track; though, when Sean turned on him and demanded his opinion, Karen and Tilly looking around his shoulder for his answer, he didn’t find it so hard to say he agreed with Abigail. 

“I didn’t like being this far south in the first place,” he justified when Sean accused him of turning tail because of his little slip-up in night patrol. The jab stung because it was a bit true, but it was a bit true because of where they were. “I especially don’t like folks like _that_ knowing where we’re sleeping.”

“That’s it exactly.” Tilly put herself between him and Sean, her being _done_ quite clear. “You don’t get it, Macguire. We shouldn’t have come round here in the first place.”

“ _I_ don’t get it? Those wanna-be English pissants ain’t too shy of saying how fond they’d be to see me swing, neither.”

“Maybe so, but they figure that only _after_ you’ve opened your big damn mouth. Now, I understand it’s difficult for you not to do that every chance you get--”

“Hey!” Karen tried to intervene, planting hands flat on Sean and Tilly’s chests and giving them both a good shove back. “What has gotten into you? We’re all on each other’s sides.”

“Are we? Because I’m feeling Jackson’s got something to say to me, and she better say it.”

“Sean,” Lenny tried, raising his voice to be heard over Tilly’s barbed _you pull your head out of your ass long enough to listen to me now, huh_ , “we’d just rather not be here. That’s all. Not saying anybody’s got it worse.”

“Speak for yourself, Lenny. I am _absolutely_ saying some of us have it worse.” 

“It isn’t a goddamn competition, Tilly!”

“You didn’t grow up around here! You don’t got your own to fear!”

They weren’t the only ones squabbling. The whole camp devolved into it, everyone shouting over one another to be heard. 

Maybe Jack getting pulled from his bed without his mother knowing was the catalyst they needed. Maybe it’d been building for a while, since moving to Rhodes, since Blackwater, since Arthur Morgan being thrown in a prison wagon that they had no business even keeping around. 

The thing was, Kieran had been easy to bully. Lenny hadn’t participated, but he’d known it based on everyone else’s nonchalant way about it. The man had proved himself a harmless wimp ignorant of the feud he’d been caught up in. Sure, maybe Dutch kept them wondering if Kieran would ever get untied from that tree, but they trusted that if he proved himself a true traitor to the O’Driscolls, he’d get out fine. 

Dragging out a man’s suffering without hope in sight-- that was cruel. Lenny knew the rules about traitors, knew and believed in the code broadly speaking, but even _if_ it went as Dutch said, the betrayal had happened over a decade prior. With the Pinkertons, he was just a man doing his job, same as anybody else. 

His father preaching eternal damnation for a few bad acts hadn’t impressed Lenny. In a camp of bona fide sinners, it impressed him even less. 

(And if Dutch would turn a blind eye to such cruelty on one man, who was to say he wouldn’t turn away from the rest of them?)

A gunshot quieted them as everyone either braced themselves to feel pain blooming or seeing a loved one fall, but it wasn’t until Dutch called for _silence!_ that the camp truly stopped their infighting.

“It has been made clear to me,” he said, his voice ringing out over them, hands up and gesturing to punctuate his words, his yet-smoking pistol waved around to do the same, “that whose ever fault it is, our camp has been compromised. Mr. Matthews will be leading the women and infirm somewhere safe, with Mr. Smith ensuring their secure passage. Now, I don’t want to hear of any back-talk to me or him. You go where you’re told, and you keep your goddamn heads down until we group up again. _Yes_ , Mrs. Adler, ‘women’ means you, too.

“A little space to clear our heads and work up a new plan, and we’ll be back on track. I do _hope_ that this sounds to everyone’s satisfaction.”

A few shuffled and shifted in place while murmurs whispered through the back, but no one dared raise their voice. 

After a pause wherein Dutch assured himself nobody questioned him, he re-holstered his pistol and clapped his hands together. 

“ _Thank_ you. As for the rest of you, saddle up. We’re paying our would-be child thieves a visit.”

Dutch had them well trained to jump when he said leap, Lenny thought to himself. They didn’t even check to see if what they’d land on was solid.

It was an uncharitable thought, one quietly, deeply shocking to have, enough that guilt dogged its heels; but in absence of anything besides terse anticipation and apprehension as the party split into their respective groups, it wasn’t exactly _uncalled for_.

As Lenny saddled up, taking his horse’s reins from Kieran - who, he noted, was also hassled by Bill into riding with them to the Braithwaite’s manor, much to Kieran’s alarm and discomfort -, he couldn’t help but spy Dutch pulling Charles aside.

Dutch stepped in close to talk to him, but Dutch’s voice had a way to carry no matter what. Besides that, Lenny had spent the first fifteen years of his life _perfecting_ the art of listening without looking like he was.

Thus, it wasn’t hard to catch the exchange, uncomfortable though it left Lenny feeling (without him really knowing why).

“Charles, please secure Mr. Morgan for transport. Despite Micah thinking otherwise, he’s made it clear he can still give a good chase when provided the opportunity. Oh. Congratulations, by the way.”

“What for?”

“You’re his new keeper.” Dutch gave Charles a pat on the shoulder. It was the opposite of a friendly gesture. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you cozying up with him. Feed him. Spoil him. Make him feel like he might have a chance of weaseling his way out of this. That’s fine. But if he steps a foot out of camp, I’ll know who to talk to.” 

“... I understand.”

“Good man.”


	4. Chapter 4

Once, many years ago, Susan Grimshaw left a no-good town and joined a trio of outlaws.

Actually, it’d been two outlaws: a sweet-talking son of a gun with a pension for finery despite despising the rich and his rough-edged, unruly child that went pink in the face when he messed up and called the son a gun _father_.

The child was eighteen when Susan came around. More man than child by virtue of his world and circumstances making him so, though it hadn’t included virtue at all.

The third outlaw showed up a week and a half into them leaving Susan’s no-good town. He’d been welcomed like family, and by how much sweeter he talked than the son of a gun, Susan saw why. 

He’d spent time with a woman by the name of Bessie. But the life had refused to let him go, and he’d rather have left before he dragged her into thieving and rustling and card-playing and all other manner of ills that Susan privately thought Bessie wasn’t as hard on as he thought. A fine-faced man like him coming and going on the regular, leaving a woman to manage her own affairs without a whiff of jealousy? Hell, that sounded like paradise to Susan’s ears.

A month in to being with the trio, and they came into enough money to buy the boy a new wardrobe. The boy wanted to spend it on liquor and a pheasant feast, which Hosea and Dutch thought uproariously funny, but as he was a boy and she was a woman and they _all_ needed a touch of manners and class if they weren’t to become common riffraff, she called the shots. So she’d taken him to town for new trousers and shirts and a nice pair of boots to replace the ones with holes, and they’d finished sooner than she expected on account of him not being as mouthy and surly about her making him try everything twice before buying as she’d expected, and they returned to camp just before the night got too dark to ride--- and she spied why Hosea hadn’t concerns over _Bessie’s_ fidelity.

Because Dutch had his fine records playing and Hosea’s face between his hands, and Hosea had his hands around Dutch’s waist, and their faces were too close for simple talking. 

“Miss Grimshaw,” Arthur said, his voice low enough not to carry, pulling her eyes from where they’d glued to the two she’d thought gentlemen outlaws, “I’m thinking the tailor done gave us the wrong socks.”

“How would they give us the wrong socks? They wrapped what you tried on in front of us.” 

That, because far as excuses and misdirections went, that was a hell of a bad one. Then again, with men like Dutch and Hosea taking care of the planning, Arthur didn’t often have to do much talking.

He stared her in the eye, face set stubborn as a mule’s. 

“They definitely did. Yep. Wrong socks. Won’t fit. Got to head back.”

Said as much without even looking at any damn socks because they were in _her_ saddlebags since his had been too full of half-empty moonshine jars and feathers and porcupine quills and what Susan imagined to be an acorn or three, though he denied any affiliation with squirrels or pack rats.

Her gaze drifted back to the two men in camp. They danced an approximate of the waltz, though the music didn’t fit and they couldn’t seem to decide who, exactly, led who. All the fumbling and foot-stepping was in good fun, apparently, as the sounds of quiet laughter reached them.

Far as deviancy went, it wasn’t the worst she’d expected out of some rough-and-tumble outlaws. 

Though she really wasn’t sure if she should be writing to Bessie or not. If it’d been another woman Hosea dallied with, she would’ve. Space was one thing. Waiting on a man who strayed and never returned was another. 

(Later, much, much later, she asked Hosea if Bessie knew. Didn’t do much than glance at Dutch - who had been instructing Arthur where to shoot a man to cripple him without killing him - to get her meaning across, because any more would’ve been too impolite, even for her.

Hosea had startled, eyes shifty, but then said: _Yes. Of course she does. There’s no lying to that woman._

Susan hadn’t believed him until she’d met Bessie. Then she’d realized Hosea and her situation was her version of paradise, straying trysts included.)

That night, she saw their options: marching in and breaking the men up before things became more damning, potentially damning themselves (or at least, herself); and, going back to town.

One option wasn’t much an option at all.

She turned her pony around. Arthur, bad liar he was, didn’t hide his immediate and obvious relief.

Even so, she felt the need to needle him a _little_ longer. Possibly for her own conscience.

“Go back to town, Arthur, really? At this hour?” 

“The night’s nothing to worry about it. I’ll keep you safe, ma’am.”

“I can keep my own damn self safe. Do a hell of a lot better than some gangly boy with a peashooter.”

“Shotgun’s not a peashooter.”

“It is in the wrong hands. Which is why you should hand it to me in case we run into anyone with impure thoughts.”

“Sure, alright, have it your way,” he said, handing it over just like that. Anything to keep her moving, she figured; anyway, he obviously favored the long distance rifle.

When asked if he _knew_ , he shrugged and said: _would have to be deaf and blind not to. They ain’t as subtle as they fancy themselves._

He was a decent lad. It’d taken work to get him there, according to Dutch and Hosea; and, sure, it took Susan a year’s work to get him to being a _good_ lad, but most didn’t have the potential in them for even that. 

A month before the job that separated them and got Arthur caught, Hosea was gone again to Bessie and Dutch brought on a new gun. Riley, a young man with hands fast as lightning and fingers light as a feather on any wallet. 

Unlike his impromptu caretakers and even though Susan was positive Dutch nor Hosea had ever laid a hand on him like _that_ , Arthur proved himself a horrifically jealous man. He ribbed Riley at every opportunity, despite being smaller than the man and not able to dodge his punches as well as he wished he could. It hit such a point that Dutch had taken him aside and given him a _talk_ , which resulted in Arthur grooming his horse, cleaning his guns, looking sullen, and generally pretending he wasn’t sulking for a full day. 

One night, Dutch misjudged Riley’s tastes. Susan never learned exactly how it started, but she knew how it ended: Riley, mouth full of accusations and foul words, dragging Dutch’s dirty laundry out for the world until Dutch had enough and wrestled him to the ground; and, Riley, chest full of lead, as Arthur shot him dead for saying such things.

Somehow, Arthur saving Dutch turned into Dutch accusing Arthur of blackmail. 

“You want to tell the law about us? You want them to drag us off, Arthur? String us up like your real daddy?”

“No! How could you think that, Dutch?”

“Seems like you don’t want us to prosper or grow, is all.”

“How’s having low-lives like _him_ \--”

“That low-life was to be your brother, Arthur!”

“We don’t need no more brothers. We got each other.”

“You turned your back on him. Hell, you killed him.”

“He was going to kill you!”

“We were having a _minor_ disagreement. It weren’t even his fault.”

Susan intervened then, but it was too late. Arthur had stomped off, looking pissed and livid and hurt. Dutch watched him go, an unpleasant, tangled-up gleam in his eye that Susan didn’t like one bit.

(When asked, Susan said she had no idea what Riley had been talking about. Dutch accepted her at her word, much to their equal relief.)

The tension lasted until Hosea returned, whereupon things seemed to smooth out.

Then there’d been the bad job. Arthur getting caught. Arthur, joining the law’s side. Or, Arthur, shipped off to involuntary work. Either way: Arthur, gone.

As the years went, the van der Linde gang grew and prospered.

And yet, Susan couldn’t remember how long it’d been since she’d seen Hosea and Dutch as happy as they’d been that night Arthur and she almost interrupted their dancing. 

Two or three years, maybe. Hell, she wasn’t even sure if they continued to dance, to music or otherwise.

“You’ve still the constitution of a bull, I see.”

Now they were all together again. It wasn’t as happy as Susan’d once daydreamed it’d be, before Arthur became more memory than man.

He being in their midst turned back the clock on that.

Fifty extra pounds and shoulders broad as a barn though he’d gained, the good lad she’d known him the potential to be hadn’t disappeared.

Any other man starved, beaten and interrogated for a week and now shackled at the ankles (Charles said Micah had bought the cursed things, but Susan had to admit they were handy) and told to lay flat in a crate-and-barrel stuffed wagon lest he be spotted and they be outed as monsters, would’ve cussed them out, struggled fiercely, and hollered at the first passer-bys to help him out. He wouldn’t do just as told, and then act like getting an apple to munch on for his troubles was payment aplenty. Especially as he fumbled more than once just to hold the damn thing, as they hadn’t time to bandage the fingers _they’d_ broke.

And yet.

“How do you figure?”

“Anybody else would’ve been drowning in their own sick by now.”

“Hm. Maybe. Guess the world don’t want to let me off so easy as a natural death.”

Around bits of apple, he talked to Hosea like anybody’d talk to a casual friend. Hosea, who sat next to Susan at the front of the covered wagon and held the reins of the Shires they’d stolen off Arthur not _so_ long ago. At Hosea’s behest, they’d ran the prison wagon into the swamp and left it to sink-- he was right about them not being able to play at being homesteaders if they carted it around, but the glee he had in getting rid of it went beyond sensical planning.

“Speaking of,” Arthur said, eyes on his apple prize, “heard that cough of yours. Reckon a natural death’s in your future, Hosea?”

“My lungs weren’t used to having to swim through the humidity to get some air, is all,” Hosea said, dutifully ignoring Susan’s _you know that ain’t it_ glance. “But, no. Don’t reckon it is.”

“Hm.” Again, and another bite of the apple. Despite how quick he went through the first half of it, he dragged out eating the second.

Hosea hmmed and hawed, as if giving the matter of his death serious consideration. He said, light and conversational in a way Susan very much despised, “At this point, I’m not too sure which method would be more preferable.”

“Guillotine.” 

“Excuse me?” Susan demanded.

Arthur’s unconcerned tone didn’t change a lick. “That’s the best way to go. Quick. Clean. Assuming the blade’s been maintained and nobody drags out you laying there, neck stretched out over the block, I reckon the anticipation’s not even so bad.”

“How many beheadings have you seen?”

“Plenty. Overseer at Guarma got the idea he wanted to be a French King for a month.” A soft scoff. “Nobody dared tell him it were the French King that got his head cut off.”

Sharing her sentiment, Hosea didn’t look too enthused over a beheading, either.

He said, “I’d rather a bullet to the head in the middle of a gunfight, personally.”

“Mm, no. Goes wrong too often. Might be left bleeding out in a field, leg stuck under your horse’s cooling body.” A curse as they hit a rock and the apple jumped from his hands. He nabbed it before it got far, frowning and looking it briefly over for scuffs before taking another nibble anyway. “Always worse to have hope somebody’ll come for you.”

Hosea cleared his throat, caught out.

Arthur didn’t look up from his food.

Susan privately thought she’d shoot them both if it’d get them out of this conversation.

“We may be closer to our end than we were twenty years ago,” she said, as their wagon line was unfortunately quiet and orderly and offering nothing in way of distractions, “but we’ve still time to do right by our people.”

A snort.

Hosea shot a look down to their mouthy prisoner. “Hear something else in the week you’ve been here, Arthur?”

“Only Dutch’s mad hatter schemes.”

“Tahiti is a reach, but he’s right about us needing money if we’re getting out of this.”

“Like he was right about there being gold in Rhodes?”

“I’m _starting_ to think he’s right about you being the reason folk are whispering.”

“ _I_ ain’t why they’re whispering. If I am, then I ain’t the cause. I’m just their excuse.”

Finally, he’d stripped the apple to its bare core. Susan watched him eye it a little sadly, a little contemplatively.

“Arthur Morgan, it’s done. Don’t you--” Susan started on reflex (and a want to again get out of the conversation and its implications), then glared at him as he bit the core clean off its stem. “Disgusting. Do you chew your chicken bones, too?”

Flicking away the stem into the crates, he said: “Food’s food, Miss Grimshaw. Waste not want not, and what not.”

She scowled further at him. Rustled through the bag between her feet, too, pulling out a candy bar she _had_ intended to give Jack, except so many people gave the boy candy and sweets after his near-kidnapping that she’d put off out of deference to the fact Abigail would have to deal with his stomach aches, tooth aches and hyperactivity while they rushed to move. 

“ _Here_. I’m taking the wrapper before you choke on that, too.” And because she didn’t want to see him struggle with undoing it. That was-- a little much, for her.

Muttering a surprised, quiet thank you and taking it very slowly, he turned real cautious at her offering the chocolate bar. All the passive aggressive fight in him left as he started nibbling on that, his attention caught up in trying to keep the chocolate from melting too fast in his hands.

The mood lifted a little, and just as fast went sideways. A cloud of gloom gathered in the front seat between Susan and Hosea, who agreed without speaking that they were no longer looking at each other lest one of them be the first to throw the _how far have we strayed_ stone.

Then Arthur asked, apropos of nothing but a quiet, genuine interest, no barbs or bites or hidden agendas, “You ever write to Bessie?” 

“She died a while back.” 

“Damn.” A beat. “I’m sorry. I-- I remember, she was a great woman.”

“The best.” Hosea cleared his throat again, gathering himself. The gloom eased off their backs. “It’s alright. I was with her ‘til the end, which is the most either of us could’ve asked for.”

“Did you get her apple pie recipe before she went?”

The chuckle surprised them all.

Hosea twisted in his seat to look down at Arthur, his fingers covered in chocolate. “You remember her apple pie?”

“It was decent.” Susan shook her head. “No better than her other goods.”

“Are you kidding? That pie was the best.” Arthur, more lively than he had yet. “She always sent him with goods, but seeing Hosea come back from visiting her in the fall was great, ‘cause I knew he’d have one of her apple pies. Unless he’d _ate it_ along the way, despite her telling him to save some for me.”

Susan raised her eyebrows at Hosea. “I didn’t know she always sent you back with sweets. You said it was a special treat when you had one to share.”

He put his hands up, which didn’t dissuade her accusations one bit. “The ride could be long! _But_ , truly, I didn’t want it going to waste because I’d packed it wrong and squashed it.”

“You was being a greedy dog, Hosea, don’t you try to excuse nothing.”

“ _Truly_ sounds as if you forgot the rest of us because of it smelling nice!”

Hosea dropped his hands, grinning. “I’ll admit. A certain sinful temptation may have possessed me to finish it before my coming back.”

“Yeah, the temptation of it being the best apple pie anybody’s ever made.” From Arthur, who’d given up trying to make his chocolate last and instead shoved it all in his mouth. It slathered extra along his chin, much to his delight.

Susan just clicked her tongue at the display, knowing then all her year-long work in shoving table manners into his head had gone to waste. If she felt fond of him all the same, that-- wasn’t as unexpected as she wished it was.

“Precisely that one, yes,” Hosea said with another chuckle. “If I’d known you’d remembered, Arthur, I would’ve had Susan ride with somebody else.”

“What else did you know that I missed, Arthur?” 

“Hey, now. Be kind to me. I’m an old man.”

“That’s nothing new,” Arthur quipped. “Well, Miss Grimshaw, did you ever hear the story of how they got that record player?”

“Arthur, maybe your memory isn’t so good as you think.”

“I think it’s doing just fine, Hosea.”

Susan responded dutifully, “Oh, of course I’ve heard that one. Hosea picked it up at an auction house. Thought it’d be something Dutch liked.”

“Auction house, huh? Is that some fancy way of saying he plucked it out of a theater hall after convincing the owner he was there to inspect it? All ‘cause of, what was it--”

“That man was robbing people with the prices he charged.”

“-- Right! ‘Cause he said your boots weren’t clean enough for you to see a show.”

As Hosea spun out an excuse-- _weren’t just my boots, Arthur; he said you smelled like you’d laid with a--_ , a smile on his face all the way, a dog brayed in the distance.

That made Arthur sit up straight, sudden as a shot.

Which in turn made Susan sit up straight, half-sure Arthur was finally going to cause them trouble. 

Hosea’s smile died off, too. Turning in the direction the dog’s noises came from, he muttered, “Not _again._ ”

“It’s just a dog,” Susan said, though she pulled her shotgun from her feet and onto her lap.

The dog, as if in answer, sounded its off-key howl once more.

“It’s Copper.” Arthur, swaying from the wagon’s rocking and his body’s weakness after all he’d been through, scrabbled to put himself back on his feet. “Stop the wagon.”

“Just cause it’s a dog doesn’t mean it’s your dog,” Hosea snapped back, harsh. “Yours or not, if it’s led the law to us--”

“He’d have nobody to lead,” Arthur assured him hurriedly, and managed to stand.

A bad development for them. Susan barked, “Sit down!”

“I won’t.” His shackles restricted him to a slow shuffle-- or, more accurately, a prolonged fall forward mitigated only by him catching himself on crates. He realized quickly he wasn’t getting out through the back, however, as it was packed too tightly; and thus, he turned to them. “Stop the damn wagon! He might need help.”

“Is everything alright back there?” Tilly asked from the wagon ahead.

“Just fine!” Hosea called -- then, catching Arthur’s stricken look as the dog’s braying neared, cursed himself and, at Susan adding to his curses, growled a _I know, I know, I’ve become a sentimental sod,_ and, loud enough for Tilly, “We’re stopping!”

“Thank you,” Arthur said over the wagon’s wheels clattering to a stop. 

“Don’t you thank me yet,” Hosea muttered, though Susan thought Arthur didn’t hear him. 

“What?” Tilly. She poked her head around the wagon’s front, frowning with concern at them. She was a good girl, Susan thought. “What for? Is Morgan giving you--?”

They stopped, too, despite Susan bidding them to keep going.

And that was how near the whole wagon train clambered out to see a coonhound with a bandaged front leg bound in a limping gait out of the underbrush, its tail wagging and tongue lolling. It barked up a storm at Hosea, who hopped from the wagon to try to calm it; similarly, it dodged all their attempts to catch it, instead circling its master’s wagon with surprising speed for an animal with only three good legs. 

Cain, jumping from his place in Abigail’s wagon, gave his own shot at a chase; but the two dogs became fast friends and soon enough caused double the trouble for the humans, thinking the whole ordeal a fun game of keep-away. 

Jack’s encouragement from the sidelines - and Arthur’s, where he stood in the wagon - certainly didn’t help.

“This has got to be a joke,” Karen half-laughed, half-complained. She shook her beer bottle at the dog, which did its best to climb up the front seat of the wagon - much to Susan and Hosea’s exasperation. “Mary-Beth! Your romance book is back on track!”

“It isn’t called a romance if it’s between a man and his dog,” Mary-Beth responded without heat.

“Yeah, it’s called true love. Truest and purest.”

“We stopped for a dog?” From Uncle, who had undoubtedly been the one to share his stash with Karen, despite him being the one that was supposed to be driving. “Thought we already had one of those. Do we really need another?”

“It’s your replacement, Uncle. This one’s actually helpful.”

“Hey! I been doing my part. Best I’m able.”

“It’s Morgan’s dog, not ours.”

“We stopped for _Morgan’s_ dog? But we didn’t stop to give my back a rest?”

“You’d barely started driving!”

Charles, their out-rider, doubled back to see what was the hold-up. 

With his help and Hosea’s not-so-reluctant blessing, the dog got a boast into the wagon and into Arthur’s waiting arms. 

Copper and his excitement knocked him clean to his ass. Though he hissed and grumbled with pain and the fall must’ve shifted something that didn’t need more shifting as it inspired a wet-sounding coughing fit, he didn’t really put up a fight.

“Where’d you get this nice collar, boy?” Susan heard him as she and Hosea loaded back up and, finally, started to get back on track. The others did the same, too, their moods over having to move without everyone together significantly lightened from the surprise reunion. “You trick somebody else into feeding you? Only to leave and break their heart? Aw, Copper. Missed you.”

He rubbed the heels of his hands into the dog’s ears, much to the dog’s overt delight. Held the beast tight once he’d worn down his energy, too, unabashed about who might see him shoving his face into his side. 

And if much later when he thought Susan and Hosea weren’t paying attention he fiddled with the collar with a vague frown, rubbing his thumb gently along its tag, it didn’t go as unnoticed as he thought. 

Once they found a decent place to stop-- north of Annesburg, one of the last places Hosea felt the law hadn’t caught on to them being- and Hosea left to send word to Dutch’s moniker, Susan checked the dog’s tag. 

She did so without worry in front of Arthur, who’d had his shackles chained to a tree next to Pearson’s mess tent. Arthur, perhaps enjoying his now-guaranteed increase in freedom of movement (certainly, he spent a good time just stretching his shoulders and arms, though near every movement made him wince), watched her without complaint or concern.

“Who’s T. Kilgore?” She asked him, her suspicion dying as he shrugged and held her gaze in his answer.

“Whatever poor sop lost his free hunting dog.”

Copper licked her hand, as unconcerned as the owner he’d been allowed to stay by. 

As there was no reason other than the memory of his frown to doubt his explanation, she swallowed her trepidation and let the two be.

 

. . .

 

“I take it you being here means the camp’s in the clear.”

“For the moment, at least.”

Humming noncommittally, Arthur kept his eyes on the slapdash job Charles did on bandaging his hands. It was only when a bone needed to be rebroken and set that he turned away, cursing under breath and kicking at the dirt as if it were Micah’s face. Or so Arthur, half-dazed from pain and gin, told him in between one splint and the next. 

“He resemble a dozen slimy toads inhabiting a corpse, or is that just me?”

“I’d say that’s an insult to toads.”

“You’re right. Tell them I’m sorry. Nothing deserves being compared to that rancid eel. Aw, shit, there I go again. Say sorry to the eels for me, too-- _fuck,_ that hurts.”

“Sorry.”

Teeth grit tight, Arthur breathed out slow. “S’ fine. Keep going.”

Strauss had refused to provide any painkillers for their prisoner, citing anxiety over it being against Dutch’s wishes as Arthur was in no danger of dying. The up-standing Reverend hadn’t been as possessive with his morphine, though he spent a good five minutes warning Charles of its devilry and how he best not trust its lying charms. Then, on handing over enough to take out a horse, charged Charles _a favor, when I can think of one!_

Figuring he had a fifty-fifty chance of remembering, Charles had agreed.

Except then Arthur _disagreed_ , saying he’d seen what morphine could do and didn’t want any part in it. Demanded alcohol instead if Charles insisted on fixing his hands or ribs or anything else, whereupon Charles had blithely remarked Arthur wasn’t much in a position to be putting conditions on anything, let alone help.

Arthur, not to be outwitted, said he’d figured the drugs were more for Charles’ benefit than his, as Arthur was sure to start hating him half-way through being fixed if kept sober.

Then he’d said, _Alright. Fine. Morphine’s fine. You’re going to have to set the needle, though; these hands aren’t suited to anything so delicate at the moment._

Not wanting to do that, Charles returned the morphine to the Reverend, who had been surprised he’d given Charles some in the first place, and thereafter fetched gin from Uncle’s stash while Uncle argued with Karen and Pearson over whose stash was whose (Uncle predictably claiming a box more than Charles knew he had was his), which he gave to Arthur without further fuss.

The camp had settled into the quiet anxiety of people doing their best to ignore their worries over something they couldn’t control. The prevailing feeling was that their men would ride back mostly fine and dandy, with maybe a few scrapes, as a consequence to the Braithwaites being taught a lesson in messing with the van der Linde gang; and, that they could put Rhodes behind them and start over, Dutch leading them right as always. 

The tension therefore had more to do with their recent string of bad luck, the question of how long they could make Annesburg work with Dutch’s vague Tahiti plan being their only long-term goal, and worst of all, the worry their men _wouldn’t_ return, because more and more often, their numbers dwindled rather than grew.

Whose fault that was, they had thoughts on but dared not speak of.

And so they argued over frivolous technicalities, set up double patrol (on Sadie’s encouragement), and fell into petty spats at the drop of a hat.

Charles, told he’d done enough patrol and who knew he wasn't the right temperament for petty spats, had decided to occupy himself with Arthur’s well-being. It was about time someone did, especially as his actions in Jack’s kidnapping hadn’t been necessary or conducive to lengthening his shortened life expectancy. That Dutch had put him in charge of the man helped keep the others off his back about it, too.

(They still side-eyed him and gave him wary looks when he took a spare bedroll from one of the pack horses and gave it to Arthur, but he was used to such treatment for far more moronic reasons.)

Thing was, Charles was no doctor. He’d learned to patch bullet wounds and knife cuts and claw gouges on himself well enough, but it became significantly more difficult to do for another person. Especially when that person drowned himself in the bottle and therefore wouldn't stop commenting on every little thing Charles did.

“Can’t feel my hands,” Arthur declared at the end, holding up hands mittened in white before his eyes.

“Because the wrapping’s too tight or because you’ve drank nearly the whole bottle?”

Squinting, Arthur brought his hands closer to his face. Turned them to one side, then the other. Flipped them this way and that. Wiggled the tips of his fingers. Didn’t wince, though they should’ve hurt him.

At his side, Copper watched his master with keen interest, his own bandaged leg stretched out long in front of him.

The splints weren’t _too_ shoddy, Charles privately thought, trying to buoy his own pride. Not so shoddy it wouldn’t do its job. They’d waited so long on straightening the mangled bones, it was a miracle he’d been able to move any of his fingers.

After too long for even Charles, Arthur slurred out: “The booze. Definitely the booze.”

“With the delicate work done, I feel as if I should catch up.” Meant with no small measure of sarcasm. 

Arthur shot him a wobbly, heavily inebriated smile. “You should! Drunk’s a fine place to be.”

On second thought, that wasn’t such a bad thought.

Arthur continued with, “Only thing that makes it better is good company. And, I-- I’m not the best company, but least I won’t be going anywhere.”

In emphasis, he rattled the shackles clapped to his legs. Tried to stand, too; overbalanced; and tipped sideways back to the dirt, his legs nowhere close to under him.

At that, he went a little green in the face. Said, when he saw Charles hovering, with a smile that more matched a grimace, “ _Definitely_ not going anywhere. Get on already. I can tell by how you’re looking at me that you’re far too sober to talk with my drunken ass.”

“How am I looking at you?”

“Stupidly.” A pained, tight exhale. His head dropped, his hair slipping and covering his face. “I’m going to… sit back up. And by the time I do, I better see you with a bottle in hand.”

A bit of him insisted he help Arthur up, first. 

But there was a thing to be said about a man in a position of little pride needing to maintain what he had left, and Charles understood that well enough.

So he did as told. Got up and fetched more gin, again from Uncle’s stash. Karen caught him, but she nodded approvingly and conspiratorially as he lifted the bottle, mouthing encouragement to the tune of _not his blasted liquor, anyway._

Came back to Arthur sitting up, one hand on Copper’s head, rubbing the solid but gauze-softened edge of the splint between his ears. 

The dog took it well enough. Seemed more happy for Charles’ return, though, especially when he sat down and therefore put himself into petting-and-lap-sitting range. As the coonhound, despite not being lap-sitting-sized, refused to give up on getting himself there, Charles accused Arthur between one swig of his bottle and the next, “You spoiled this dog, didn’t you?”

“His fault, not mine. _You_ try resisting those eyes.”

As Copper made himself comfortable across Charles’ legs and he didn’t find the heart to shove the grinning dog off, he had to admit, “Fair enough. I see what you mean.”

“Like him far more than any person.” This, definitive in the way only the most drunk could be. “Glad he’s back. Glad he," a significant pause, Arthur staring plain and simple at the animal, "made it.”

That ending, more somber than expected. 

Taking time to think and wish a bit that alcohol worked faster than it did, Charles scratched along Copper’s bare neck. It’d taken him a while, but Arthur had gotten the collar off eventually; gave it thereafter to Jack for Cain, saying a stray like that needed some marker so it wasn’t mistaken as rabid just because it was hungry.

The reasoning flew over Jack’s head, but he’d happily buckled the nice leather around Cain’s neck. Said it made him _really_ their dog. 

Cain hadn’t been as enthused, stopping every five feet to scratch at it, much to Abigail’s quiet amusement. 

_He’s starting to remind me of John_ , she’d told Charles. _Doesn’t know a good thing even when it's stuck to him._

To Arthur, Charles said, “Bit miraculous he didn’t just survive but found you, too.”

“Yeah.” Falling quiet, Arthur stared blankly at Copper. Charles, sensing he was somewhere else, gave him time to formulate his words. Eventually, Arthur managed it, saying, “Went so mad when he got shot, I can’t rightly tell you all that followed. Just remember my hands around somebody’s neck and being pissed off they wouldn’t die.” 

“It happens, sometimes. That kind of anger.”

“Shouldn’t. It’s dangerous.”

“Lot of things in the world are.”

“You ever been that far gone?”

“Sure.” Arthur looked up to him, apparently astonished. Charles tried not to laugh at him-- he managed mostly because the memory wouldn’t much allow it. “After we ran into you with that photographer of yours--”

“Mason?”

“-- Mason. Yes. We’d been hunting buffalo. Ran into poachers, instead.” 

By how Arthur’s face dropped, he didn’t need to say more. It was heartening to know he and his mother’s people weren’t alone in seeing the needless slaughter for what it was, but he knew well enough one man didn’t make too much a difference.

He continued. “Didn’t feel like I could rest until I saw them dead. John stopped me before I made too much of a mess of them, but if he hadn’t, I would’ve. Happily.”

“That’s the scariest part,” a wince, as if the memory pained him, “that glee in working out your anger. Leaves you hollow once it’s done.”

“It does. But in the moment, you aren’t thinking about that.”

“No. Suppose not.” A pause. “Good thing somebody turned you away before you got too close to doing what you’d regret.”

“It was. I’m sorry your somebody had to be Bill.”

“Hah. Me too.”

Arthur had propped himself against the tree Charles secured him to, the rope between his shackles and the tree slack enough for him to kick out his feet. Charles had put himself next to him, leaning back on the same tree. 

As they lapsed into companionable silence, Arthur bumped his shoulder against Charles’ and then, possibly because he couldn’t be bothered to right himself, stayed there, weight warm and heavy.

Not wanting to call attention to it, Charles didn’t shrug him off.

The alcohol had yet to make itself truly known in Charles’ system, so that couldn’t be blamed. At least not on Charles’ part.

He took another drink to encourage it along.

“Hey, uh. Charles.” 

“Yeah?”

“When Dutch’s boys get back. And Dutch gets back.”

Charles stilled.

Copper’s head lifted as his source of scratches stopped. He licked at Charles’ hand in encouragement; then huffed and sighed and finally flopped off his lap, as Charles gently pushed his head away.

“I have the feeling a… a time’s going to come. A time when you’ll have to decide where you’re heading.” Arthur’s voice dropped to little more than a rasp, every word scraped forcefully from him. Charles didn’t dare interrupt, lest he reconsider sharing. “You gotta realize. This way of life, all this freedom and dreaming of a new tomorrow, it’s at its end. For _everybody,_ not just you or this camp or John or Dutch.”

The trick to getting Arthur Morgan to talk, Charles realized then and there, was not pain or starvation or any other manner of torture.

A little bit of kindness, and he’d split himself open without second thought.

Vehemence gripped Arthur’s voice, providing fire where there had been defeated resignation. He shifted closer, pressed himself side-to-side and leg-to-leg with Charles, though his head ducked low to his chest. 

“And to get out, you got to realize… There’s no more waiting. No more daydreaming. You and, Abigail and her boys, and anybody else here that has half a chance at making it somewhere else. Don’t squander your chance, Charles. Tell me you won’t.”

“Arthur.” 

His head jerked up at his name, then dropped back down. Turned away from Charles. The realization he had said too much hit him quickly; Charles watched it, let the defeat and fear and hopeless hope play out.

And threw him, a good man with more chance than he thought, a rope.

“You’re drunk.”

Arthur blinked.

Licked his lips. Bit at the inside of his cheek.

Glanced to Charles, quick and wary and almost curious.

“Suppose I am.” Raised his chin off his chest, face turned to Charles more fully, head at a cautious tilt. “Don’t know what I’m saying.”

Charles said, easily, “I reckon not.”

“Never mind me, then.” He shifted away. Charles kept his hands around his bottle and didn’t reach to pull him back. “Just-- just, caught up in my own head.”

“That sounds right. Maybe it’s best you sleep.”

“Always with the good ideas, Charles.”

After that, he tilted himself onto his bedroll. Patted an empty spot in front of him until Copper nestled in and let him throw an arm over him. 

Soon after, lulled by alcohol and the night’s events-- though Charles was sure he hadn’t thought himself capable-, he fell asleep.

Once the sleep deepened enough Charles leaving wouldn’t wake him, Charles stood. Went to the edge of camp, perched as it was on a cliffside, and stayed up until dawn, thinking.

 

. . .

 

Wondered if he was too soft, too, same as Morgan.

Wondered if he much minded. Decided he didn’t.

Sifted through the options. Found too many, but only one anywhere close to _right._

 

. . .

 

He told Abigail. 

Then, he did what the others thought he did too much. 

He kept quiet.


	5. Chapter 5

“Welcome back.”

John gave Arthur the side-eye.

“Looks like you’ve gotten real cozy.”

Standing, back against his tree for support, Arthur surveyed his limited domain - a bedroll, pail of water, and a half-chewed stick his dog had been working over before scampering off to who-knew-where, as well as his shackles and chains - and raised both eyebrows.

“Sure have,” he drawled, “it’s like I’m practically part of the family.”

John snorted.

It wasn’t entirely derisive.

Arthur shifted his weight. Put his bandaged hands behind him. Looked John - safe and sound, not a scrape unhealed - up and down.

Said, “Braithwaites went well, I take it.”

“It went.” John turned his head, spat. Dug into his pocket for smokes and a matchbook. Shook one out for himself -- thought to himself, _why not_ \-- and offered it to Arthur, who took it with the barest hesitation and quiet thanks. “Ended the Gray’s feud for ‘em. Thinking they should be thanking us.”

“Thinking you’re lucky they haven’t followed you here for a _chat_ about stealing their great-great-grandpappy’s dream.”

“They wanted to chat, alright. Ran us out of town. Killed Bill. Near killed Javier. Might’ve crippled Sean.”

Javier and Sean, both laid out under Miss Grimshaw’s care and so drowned in Strauss’ medicine they thought themselves in cold, rainy heaven. Yet Sean’s fever refused to break and his leg, which had been full of buckshot for the two day ride it took to lose the Grays for more than an hour, had an infection that looked more green than red. He was in denial about it, but Miss Grimshaw wouldn’t let him stay in denial for much longer. 

Better the leg than the man, she said.

Sean disagreed, claiming it was his favorite leg and he couldn’t stand going anywhere without it. Then he started laughing an awful laugh, which Karen told him to _stop_ but he couldn’t. Eventually, Miss Grimshaw gave him another dose of morphine to get him to quiet.

Once the morphine took him under, he’d probably lose the leg.

Rather, he’d definitely lose the leg.

Maybe Sean wasn’t the only one in denial about it.

Javier had more of his wits about him, but he’d taken a stomach wound. There wasn’t much to do for that than keep the bleeding down, the pus out, and pray.

Rhodes ended up being too hot and loud to take the pair to a doctor. 

Luck had it that they ran into a traveling black doctor named Alphonse Renaud on the road. Luck also had it Dr. Renaud had lost his supplies and wagon and expectation of good-will to ex-Confederate degenerates more than a fortnight prior, and so was stuck working with what John could afford to fetch. 

What he’d done hadn’t been all they needed, the Doctor said, but should’ve been enough for them to make it. Lord, he hoped they’d make it. 

Five days after that, John got word through Hosea’s recognizable alias where the camp was. That _they’d_ made it perfectly fine was the first brush of truly good news John and his fever-struck, heavily wounded companions had. Making their discrete way to Annesburg hadn’t been the easiest-- he swore he saw Grays and Braithwaites in every white face they passed-, but it had at least been quiet.

The three of them turned out to be the first to return. That brought its own concerns, especially with the right _state_ Dutch had been in before they split to better evade notice, but there wasn’t anything John could do about it. He’d gotten himself, Javier and Sean to the camp; he’d do patrol same as anybody else and scout when possible, but mostly, he wanted to stick by Abigail and Jack and assure himself that they, at least, were and would be fine.

“You expecting me to feel bad for the loss?”

Dragged back to the present in time to realize Arthur and he had worked half-way through their cigarettes in silence, John winded back his mind to what they’d been talking about. Arthur didn’t rush him, maybe sensing his mind was still far away. Locked back in that blazing manor, Dutch having them shove a heavy dresser against Catherine’s bedroom door. Her, screaming and crying and pounding her frail, blue blooded fists against that door, cursing their graves to her last breath.

Loss of who?

Right.

Williamson.

“No.” Because there wasn’t any point pretending Arthur would. Bill hadn’t minded how they treated their Pinkerton. “Just thought you should know. The sheriff put a window in his head when we didn’t surrender fast enough for his liking.”

“Huh. Never thought I’d be jealous of an inbred, backwoods sheriff, but here I am.” A beat. He picked at his hand’s bandages, his cigarette dangling from the side of his mouth. “They got you in that bad a bind?”

“Guess so. They expected us to show that morning. Had the whole town cleared for a gunfight.” John dug the toe of his boot into the dirt. “Not bad for an inbred, backwoods town full of easy gold.”

“Boars are plenty dumb, too. Doesn’t mean you ever stop watching the tusks.”

John thought about bringing up how much they’d stopped watching _Arthur’s_ threat. The girls brought him meals and Hosea was all too happy to talk with him in the guise of needing a quiet place to read and Charles all but wrote on John’s forearm a reminder about how he shouldn’t mess with him.

Abigail got on him about it, too. Told him to leave off Morgan, then turned around and said she needed to speak with him privately once he’d rested up and calmed his nerves.

Curious why she’d tell him to leave off, he of course put himself right next to Morgan.

(He had his own reasons, too, but Abigail made for a good excuse.)

Which Morgan sussed out when their cigarettes ran out and John immediately offered him another.

“Thanks for the update,” Arthur said, hesitating a few seconds longer before deciding he wasn’t going to look the gift horse in the mouth and accepting a smoke, “but forgive me for thinking something else’s lingering on your mind.”

Pride over being caught out reared its ugly head. “Not my fault you’re--,” except then he couldn’t figure out what exactly Arthur was. 

“Tied to the best tree in camp?” Drawled. “Funny. Hosea says the same. Somehow he’s more convincing, even though we all know it’s a horseshit excuse.”

Glaring downward, John dropped the mostly-ash stub of his smoke and snubbed it under a heel. 

“Wanted to,” he cleared his throat, keeping his eyes down, “say thanks.”

Judging by Arthur’s silence, that hadn’t been expected. 

Catching the smug bastard wrong-footed put confidence back in John’s words. 

“For saving Jack. Boy would’ve been carted off no trouble if you hadn’t started hollering.”

Arthur rubbed at his cheek. He’d grown a decent beard, scraggly though it was. 

“Lot of kids like him get sold off to pay their idiot parent’s debts. Whatever good they have gets snuffed out real quick.” 

“Seen it too. All the same, I imagine you had a good chance of getting away if you’d kept your mouth shut. But you didn’t.”

“Yeah, well.” He dropped his second cigarette before it’d finished, rubbing the paper and sparks into the dirt with carefully bridled agitation. “Thought they’d distract you lot longer than they did. And, anyway, I never cared much for folks who bring children into their disputes, right or wrong though their grievances are.”

“They had plenty of reason to hate us. We really worked them over.” John scoffed, amusement breaking up the moment’s heaviness. “Stole their liquor, then sold it right back to them. Stole their horses, then sold those, too, pinning it on the other family. Even heard Mary-Beth and Karen helped two lovestruck kids exchange letters across the fence, then turned around and ratted them out to their parents.” 

Arthur whistled, low and amused and maybe, despite himself, impressed. 

Though worn through and exhausted besides, the high of barely escaping keeping his paranoia up despite being safe in camp, a smirk worked its way to John’s face. 

“Yeah. _That_ apparently caused a stir amongst the cousins-- as in, we found out there were a whole lot of cousins. Those folk certainly kept themselves busy even without us.”

“There’s always a pack of cousins. I mean, think about it. What else are they gonna do in a town like that?”

“Guess so. Not sure how they kept track.”

“Don’t think their family tree’s often on their mind, ‘cept making sure its roots don’t spread far.”

_Hah!_

Arthur flashed him a grin. 

John stopped himself from returning it, though just barely.

The silence to follow was less strained (by Arthur’s caution and John’s darker thoughts) and more companionable.

Hosea wasn’t so wrong about Arthur having the best view, John thought; or maybe it was just because he was on the other side of their sleeping tents, away from the horses’ manure pile and the bustling mess tent. Set perfectly to let the forest’s birdsong and rustling varmint mix with the camp’s daily chores, it was removed but not too much so. Quiet, but not unbearably.

Great for eavesdropping from. 

As proven when Miss Grimshaw asked Strauss to fetch his bonesaw, her somber voice carrying. 

“Think I might get something to drink.” John looked to Arthur. “Want any?”

“Anything but gin.”

John’s eyebrows pinched together. “Here I am, offering a drink when I don’t have to, and you’re making conditions?” 

“If gin’s all you got, it’s all yours.”

“What’s wrong with gin?”

Arthur gave him a miserable look.

John put up his hands. “Okay, okay. Jeez. I’ll see what I can find.”

‘Thanks.”

As he went and scrounged bourbon from his saddlebag, he heard Arthur mutter about _day-jah vu_ , whatever fancy French nonsense that was.

 

. . .

 

To more than a few folk’s shock, Kieran returned next.

“They got Mr. Bell,” he said as he half-fell, half-rolled off his sweat-lathered horse. “I was-- I tried to save him, really, I did, but it happened fast, and then there was too many for me to do much.”

He looked like he hadn’t slept in the days it took him to reach camp. Given that he had to dodge O’Driscolls on top of everyone else, it probably wasn’t too much a stretch from the truth.

“Who did?” Hosea asked, taking the reins from Kieran’s shaking hands and telling him to take a seat at the fire before he spooked his horse into bolting into camp. “The Braithwaites? The Raiders? The law?”

“Is there anybody who doesn’t want to grab us?” From Mary-Beth, who’d dogged Hosea on Kieran’s approach.

“I’m afraid not.”

Kieran shook his head at each, wringing his hands together. Mary-Beth quickly put herself at his side, though even she hesitated on draping an arm around his mud- and sweat-soaked shoulders.

“Pinkertons.”

Unbidden, Hosea’s eyes snapped to Arthur Morgan.

Seated by his tree with his dog at his feet, hands stronger and more simply bandaged, he looked back evenly and plainly. A little curiously. 

There was no way he’d heard what Kieran said. He unintentionally proved so as his curiousity turned to caution, slowly pushing himself up to his feet.

Hosea tore his eyes away. Refocused on Kieran, who looked to him as if he’d have the answers.

He was getting awfully tired of that look. How Dutch dealt with it day in and day out, he had no idea.

“We’ll get him back. Once everyone’s back together, we’ll work out a plan. We always do.”

 _Not always,_ he thought, eyes again straying to Arthur Morgan. 

Kieran, missing the shadow behind his eyes, nodded gratefully and trustingly. They’d really done a number on the man, Hosea thought then. He’d fooled himself into thinking _they_ had rescued _him_ by taking him from the O’Driscoll camp.

That was part of Dutch’s charm, though. Always had been. Always would be.

Reason told Hosea he needed to question Arthur.

Reason told Hosea, too, that Arthur would have nothing to say. He’d been chained to the tree since they’d set up camp. He hadn’t left their wagon on the trip up. He hadn’t even been able to shit without somebody knowing.

He’d been stuck in one place so long, stuck healing from _their_ torture, that he’d started withering. Skin sallow, bags under his eyes purple from bad sleep and a limited diet, content to sit and wait with his dog, he didn’t much look a threat. The most he did was alleviate the boredom of anyone willing to approach him with mindless conversation.

That was more than most outsiders ever received the chance to do and dangerous to a degree they’d never before allowed in their camp, Hosea knew.

But if the Pinkertons had wanted him back, they hadn’t tried too hard. And however they’d gotten Mr. Bell, Arthur had nothing to do with it. 

He questioned Arthur, but only on the Pinkerton’s likely holding locations.

Arthur said he didn’t know Annesburg’s region well, having been contracted as Cornwall’s eyes specifically for the van der Linde gang, but he knew the post in Van Horn often carried letters and packages for the Agency.

“We’ll start there, then.” Without thinking, and then too late to take it back: “Thank you, Arthur.”

“No rush,” Arthur called after him as he forced his legs to get him away before he said any other sentimental nonsense. “For all the great time we spent together, I could never figure out what you saw in Mr. Bell that made him worth keeping around.”

Hosea didn’t pause to reply, because he was a little right.

But now, more than ever, they needed to stand together.

 

. . .

 

Unbeknownst to Hosea, not everyone agreed on the same dream.

“I wouldn’t mind being a rancher.”

“A rancher? You?”

“Don’t sound so skeptical! I’d make a fine rancher.”

“Ranching what? Cattle, or outlaws?”

“ _Arthur._ ”

“H-hey, now, I’m just joking, Abigail. Didn’t mean nothing by it.”

Both smiling though they might’ve been, Abigail shoved him all the same. 

It turned out men stuck with idle hands made for fantastic babysitters. Arthur had long won Jack’s trust by virtue of having Copper, but with the addition of his mother’s approval and Arthur being plenty happy to read to him, Jack was a few peaceful afternoons away from calling him _Uncle Arthur._

Abigail didn’t want her boy calling a man in chains that, but then, she had the feelings he wouldn’t be in chains much longer. 

If that feeling had to do with a Charles Smith pulling her aside to warn her that she’d best keep her bags packed and head down, well. It was all the more certain a feeling for it.

“What do you want to do, then, if you’ve got so many bright ideas about what a person is and isn’t good for?”

“Me?” Arthur blinked at her like Jack when he found somebody’s candy stash. “I’ve done plenty of jobs. Ranching was one of the better ones, though it got real tedious real fast.”

“Not what _have_ you done,” Abigail corrected, shaking her head with exaggerated exasperation, “what would you _like_ to do?”

“Oh.” Arthur scratched at his chin, grimacing at the scrape of his beard. “Hm.”

“There has to be something,” she pressed.

“Not really. Done a lot, as I said. Aside from Guarma, I could never stay in one place long.”

“For a variety of reasons, I’m sure.”

He smiled at nothing. It went morose at the end.

“Didn’t even stay in Guarma long as I was supposed to, if you want the truth.”

“That doesn’t surprise me one bit. So, come on. If you could do anything. What would you do?”

Not long though he’d been in camp, John had noticed her and Jack hanging around Arthur. He’d questioned her on it, in the round-about way of his.

Which was to say, he’d asked if she’d be alright that he started sleeping in the same space as her, and then _didn’t_ cause a fight when she’d admitted that’d make her very happy, to act so normal. 

He then proceeded to circle her the night and day after like a dog sensing another encroaching on his territory, which she had put up with for all of twenty-four hours before snapping at him that Arthur was good with Jack and a good man despite the circumstances and if John didn’t give her space, she’d start measuring him against John, too.

 _As if you haven’t already?_ John’d snapped, their familiar bickering gaining a sharp edge.

_John Marston, you are a blockheaded ingrate, but no matter how often the world tries to convince me otherwise, I love you because you’re you. And Arthur Morgan is no you._

_That’s for sure. He gets on better with Jack than I do._

_That is neither his nor Jack’s fault._ John had abated at that, rubbing the back of his neck and half-turning from her. Exasperation warring with sympathy only for both to be overtaken by her foolish heart, she added, soft: _Where the world failed to turn me away, you might succeed, if you insist on treating me like I can’t have my own friends._

_I-- I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just. The worst part is, he is a good man._

For John, that meant agreement and understanding. It also made her wonder what Arthur had done to make John admit as much, in a voice that spoke to admiration where there should’ve been envy.

Abigail had wanted to take him aside then and there. Tell him what Charles told her about the possibility of Pinkertons putting an end to their life on the lam, and soon. 

But it wasn’t to be. After the move and separation, everyone in camp gathered tight to live in one another’s pockets. Uncle showed up, having been eavesdropping, and ribbed John over his idolizing their Pinkerton pal. 

The moment passed. And then John left to do errands in Annesburg with Sadie for Pearson, and Abigail watched Jack bring Arthur another book to read him until he grew too restless for reading and chased Copper and Cain around instead, leaving Abigail as alone with Arthur as anyone could be alone with anyone in a camp so crowded.

(She told John later of what Arthur warned her-- later, after Dutch’s return and after the Pinkerton in question was dragged up for little more than an execution.)

And they’d gotten to talking about dreams and freedom, all without Abigail tipping on that Charles had told her what he’d said.

(Except Arthur probably knew anyway, as he wasn’t so quick to devolve to careful one-word answers as he usually was.)

Arthur, who finally shrugged and glanced away when Abigail nudged him with an expectant _well?_

“It’s more about the people than the job. For making a dream come true, I mean.”

“I guess.” 

He looked back to her, smile lopsided at what he saw. 

“You’ve never been unsure about what you wanted to do?”

She sniffed. “I’ve always known what I wanted. It’s the getting there that’s taken some time.”

“Ever hear of Armadillo?”

She frowned. “You can’t farm armadillos.”

“Not for farming. The town.” When she shook her head, he explained, “It’s this spit of a town in New Austin. Recently had a sweep of dysentery after a bad brush with the Spanish flu, but the townsfolk, they keep on anyway.” 

“Sounds lovely.” 

“Don’t it?” His smile went wistful. “I always liked it. Everybody telling them to leave, that their land’s cursed and too poor to grow anything except prickly pears, and them refusing to listen to a word. That’s the untamed west’s spirit if I ever did hear of it. 

“But, anyway, next to Armadillo is this ranch. The MacFarlane’s. They’re pretty new and always in need of help.”

“Isn’t that where you sold my husband’s horse?”

“You remember?” She rolled her eyes at his sheepish expression. “Uh. Yes. Same place.”

“‘Course I remember. Old Boy was sorely missed. His new mare’s not near big enough for Jack and me to ride with him as comfortably.”

Arthur looked at her side-long. “He named that horse Old Boy?”

“Don’t be mean. Yours is Buell, which sounds like a-- a trumpet.”

“I didn’t decide his.” Then, after a considering pause that lasted enough to get her to raise her eyebrows at him, “Before him was a gorgeous girl named Boadicea. I’ll take credit for her.”

She huffed a laugh, giving him another, tiny shove. “And you’re making fun of Old Boy?”

“Fair enough.” He rearranged his legs, shifted himself to sit on his other side. Both ignored the clank of heavy but short chain. “I had a point in telling you about-- oh. Yeah. MacFarlane’s. They might have work, if you wanted it.”

She went quiet.

“Owner’s got this spitfire of a daughter named Bonnie… She’s not too much younger than you, I don’t think. They’re good folk. Tell them you know Arthur Hawk, the one that rooted out Cortez, and they might not even run you out before you’re done talking.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

He nodded. Went quiet, too, the air between them full of a dozen things unspoken.

“If you’re really so clueless over what you want,” she said eventually, deciding and breaking the silence before she could think better of it, “maybe you could join us in ranching.”

Arthur hummed, low in his throat. Seemed ready to deny her, but then got a look at her face, and stopped the foolishness before it could manifest.

If his eyes lingered a bit below hers, somewhere around her mouth, she didn’t bring it up. 

“I’m not so clueless on what I want,” he assured her after too long a pause, his eyes back on hers, darker than they had been. “But. That sounds alright. Maybe. In some version of the future where Cornwall hasn’t got my num.”

She gave him a smile. Kept it light, despite the temp her heart beat out.

Said, like a promise, “Keep it in mind.”

And he said, like _thank you_ , “I’ll do that.”

 

. . .

 

Javier’s fever broke, but he was put on strict bedrest.

Sean stabilized, too, though shorter on one side by a foot and some. He and Karen drank themselves to the bottom of bottle after bottle, to the point that Tilly asked Hosea to intervene.

There was no intervening until Sean healed enough for a replacement, he told her, which she barely accepted. There was nothing to be done for it; at the moment, the bottle was all Hosea could see keeping Sean in bed and not making his chances of surviving the longer haul worse.

Thankfully, Lenny’s return - the day after Kieran’s - raised their spirits. Sadie, who had made herself into quite the guard with her own shotgun and wardrobe, welcomed him in.

When Dutch rode in two days after and they realized that was everyone except the one they needed to rescue, Bill’s absence was felt as sorely as Davey’s, and Mac’s, and Jenny’s. 

Their tentative relief lasted only for that afternoon. Because then Hosea fully informed Dutch what had happened to Micah; because then Dutch caught sight of Copper sniffing around with Cain, and when asked whose dog that was, was given the truthful answer; because then Dutch, having mentioned he’d had _troubles_ shaking his followers, lost his cheer over his return and instead fell into a mood tempestuous enough to split the earth.

“And what does our Pinkerton have to say for himself?”

“He wasn’t involved,” Hosea answered, less easily than he would’ve liked. Dutch’s moods had long been volatile, but the look in his eye as he spat out the word _Pinkerton_ \-- it matched the look in his eye when Colm came up. Worse, maybe, as at least Colm carried the history such hatred deserved. 

They stood in Dutch’s tent, the flaps drawn shut. Outside as dusk fell, the party reacquainted themselves with one another, scraping together whatever cheer they could manage. By the sounds of Javier’s guitar and no voices joining in, it wasn’t much.

Dutch demanded, “How can you be sure?”

“Because he hasn’t left our camp in weeks,” Hosea returned, incredulous despite himself. “How on earth would he be involved with Micah’s capture in the last few days?”

“Seems to me our luck went sour ever since he started tailing Marston. _Especially_ soured it when he made known his identity.”

“We haven’t been the best at laying low.”

“We haven’t been sticking to the plan!”

“What plan, Dutch? You burning down that manor was hardly part of any plan.”

“ _That_ was necessity. _The plan_ is the one I’ve been working on, the one I know _he’s_ been ruining. I can’t-- damn it, Hosea, put aside your doubt for one night and trust me on this. All our woes is because of him. Have you spoken to Charles about him?”

“Charles? What does he have to do with this?”

“He’s been swayed by the rat’s plight. I could tell by the look in his eye before we left Rhodes, but I’d hoped he’d come to his senses after seeing what he brought us.”

Hosea couldn’t believe his ears. He tried to turn himself around to see how Dutch reached such a conclusion, but he couldn’t track. 

Arthur being connected to the Pinkertons was one thing, but their feud in Rhodes, too? And Charles’ loyalty?

“That makes no sense.” Again, Hosea thought through a few choice words, but he hadn’t tried to out-fox Dutch in decades. He found himself woefully unprepared to start anew, especially as he had no idea what kind of mystical fox Dutch was making Arthur out to be. “Arthur’s just… just, our prisoner.”

Dutch narrowed his eyes at him. Curled his lip, his mood darkening into something dangerous.

He asked, low and quiet and apropos of _nothing_ , “I see he’s been turning you against me, too, old friend.”

That struck like a lightning bolt. 

“After all we’ve been through?” Hosea hardly heard his own voice, it sounded so faint in his ears. “You dare accuse me of turning against you?”

“Not your fault, of course,” Dutch said, raising from his cot and putting himself toe-to-toe with Hosea, “he’s good at playing the victim. Always had been. Amazing, given how much a brute he could be.”

“Listen to yourself, Dutch. You need,” a few things crossed Hosea’s mind, but he settled on, “to rest.”

“I know what I need to do.” Dutch turned from him, shoulders stiff and back tense. Hosea reached for him, but was shrugged off, harshly. “Took me weeks, like you said, but I got there.”

Dread. That was dread, heavy as a stone in his stomach. It kicked him into action, moved him to say, “Think about this. We all need time to rest.”

“There will be time to rest when I’ve done what I should’ve when they dragged him into camp,” Dutch replied, worryingly blase. 

Dread pushed his heart into his throat as Dutch re-hooked his gun belt, pistols included, around his waist and stepped from his tent.

“Mr. Smith! Please, fetch Mr. Morgan. He has some explaining to do.”

 

. . .

 

Andrew Milton would be far too pleased if Arthur died now.

That thought and that thought alone made him call Copper over when he saw Dutch ride in to camp. Copper came, tailing wagging; and then Copper went, snuffling excitedly at the scrap of cloth Arthur had found wrapped in the dog’s original bandages and bounding away at Arthur’s fervent ear-scratch and, _find Drew. Go on, find Drew. Can’t be too far, boy. You go find him and bring him here._

Whether Copper had a reliable scent or not after so long, Arthur didn’t know. Ideally, Milton wasn’t sleeping wherever he’d perched his vulturous ass and would notice the familiar dog loping alone around Annesburg’s hills.

Dutch took his sweet time in pulling Arthur up for a chat. The anticipation for these sorts of things _was_ always the worst. No one would ever convince Arthur differently.

(Hopefully, there’d be a chance for somebody to try-- and wasn’t that a novel thought?)

Once Dutch started, however, he wasted no time.

First, he had Charles pull Arthur up. Charles cut the rope with his knife and forced him to trudge to Dutch’s tent, not a second of hesitation in him. When Arthur attempted to meet his eyes, though, it lasted a passing moment only-- his hesitation thereafter in how he refused to hold his gaze, and beyond that, the hard set in his jaw. The strength of his grip in Arthur’s upper arm.

 _Whatever happens, know you did what you could,_ Arthur wanted to tell him, but that was-- too much. And they were under too close a watch.

If nothing else, Arthur knew his best skill and folly: not saying what he should’ve when he could’ve.

Once Arthur was there, Dutch made a grandiose remark about Arthur enjoying their hospitality. In the midst of it, under the watchful, wary and puzzled - depending on the person - eye of his followers, he pulled out one of his pistols and shot clean through Arthur’s chains. 

“Kind of you,” Arthur remarked as he shifted his feet more than shoulder-width apart for the first time in what must’ve been weeks, unable to check his tongue as his hips and back popped in due protest.

“We haven’t been so kind to you. I’ll admit that.” Dutch stood not five steps from him, his pistol still in hand. Behind him stood Hosea, his eyes on Dutch. “But then, you’ve been keeping plenty from us, haven’t you?”

Arthur knew his second-best skill: keeping quiet. It went hand-in-hand with his best, typically speaking.

“Don’t know what you mean,” he said, keeping his voice level.

He glanced around the crowd, then. Scanned who he’d made an impression on and who he hadn’t. 

Javier - the man clever with a knife - sat, watching attentively. All interest on Dutch. Bill and Micah were gone, of course. 

The rest watched him. More than a few looked uncertain as to Dutch’s intentions.

 _Told you, Milton. They’re no O’Driscoll, they’ve still got minds of their own,_ Arthur thought, a flash of vindictive victory in him. 

But it was too early to count those chickens. As Dutch proved to him, closing their gap by two steps, pistol half-raised. A _look_ in his eyes. Same as when he’d accused Arthur of betraying him that first time, over Riley’s still-cooling body-- only worse, so much worse, and _oh, Dutch, what happened to you? Thought you’d amount to so much more._

An idle thought. Arthur cared to know in the abstract, as an explanation for why he’d turned out the way he had, too. They were two empty bastards clinging to life in a world that wouldn’t miss them.

( _Abigail might. Charles might. Jack, Hosea--_

Arthur hadn’t planned his exit in a way that satisfied Milton’s exacting, perfectionist nature, but if he had, it definitely didn’t include concern over any of Dutch’s people.

 _That_ useless nonsense was what happened when he relied on any bit of luck to see him through.)

“One of ours was taken by some of yours.” Dutch kept his voice level, too. Pleasant, almost, like they were chatting over some fucked up picnic. “We need to get him back.”

“Told you, there’s an Agency presence at Van Horn, but--”

“You had nothing to do with him being snatched out of thin air?”

Behind Dutch, Hosea’s face crumpled and complicated. 

Arthur had long learned there was no relying on anyone but yourself. All the same, a bit him - a young bit, a bit he hadn’t thought survived - clung to that expression, hoping, near begging: _listen to me, Hosea. You know he’s gone off the deep end._

Regardless of the new spark in his chest, he kept his eyes away from Hosea. Away from Dutch, too. Lingered instead on Lenny Summers; on Mary-Beth Gaskill; on Kieran Duffy, who hadn’t been in the Agency’s records and, god willing, never would. 

He told Dutch, simple and plain, “Don’t see how I would. If I could’ve snapped my fingers and had that jackass carted off, I would’ve done it before he’d snapped _my_ fingers.”

Javier frowned, but didn’t speak. It had been Bill, not Micah, breaking his bones-- the blond fuck had been too cowardly for that. At the time, drunk on pain, Arthur hadn’t hesitated in telling him he found his cowardice quaint and charming; which was how he’d found out Micah _didn’t_ mind kicking a downed man.

Dutch was none too impressed with his cheek.

The pistol clicked as he raised it. Leveled it at his head. 

Arthur kept his eyes on the crowd. Met Sean Macguire’s, prior Irish rebel. Simon Pearson’s, prior navy. Molly O’Shea, silent and paler than even the record went.

John Marston’s, the only member to leave the gang a full year and be welcomed back with minimal fuss.

(Arthur’d hoped that meant he were more amenable to questioning the van der Linde dream. For a time, back in New Austin, he’d thought himself very wrong; now, John watching the exchange like a hawk and looking none too pleased at its direction, he wasn’t too sure.

Hard to be sure about anything other than his heart pounding loud as a dozen horses across the prairie, his palms sweating, his everything gambled on this last moment.)

“Dutch,” Hosea said, stepping forward to intervene or negotiate-- and stopping, as Dutch snapped a hand up to halt him.

“Old friend,” Dutch said, not to Hosea but to Arthur, “you’ve been turning my family and friends against me.”

“This how you treat old friends?” 

An echo of a question asked an eon ago. No wince or flinch as Dutch stepped forward and snapped the pistol under his chin, forcing his head up a touch and his eyes forward.

For a moment, anyway. Then he went back to scanning the crowd.

Tilly Jackson, eyes huge and hands fisted tight at her sides. Sadie Adler, also not in the Agency records, and looking mad as a hornet. Susan Grimshaw and, clinging to her skirts, Abigail Roberts’ boy, Jack. 

He skipped over looking at Jack. Boy didn’t need to remember being silently guilted by a soon-to-be-corpse.

_Wait._

Where was Abigail?

“You’re right. You’re no friend of ours, Mr. Morgan,” Dutch said. “Now. Tell us where the Agency is keeping Mr. Bell. And look me in the eye while you’re doing it.”

“I don’t know where they’ve got your rabid dog.” Slow. Measured. Cold metal biting into his jaw, sinking its chill into his bones. “But I know they’re on their way here.”

The gun wavered. Dutch blinked, startled. 

Then narrowed his eyes. Jabbed it harder into Arthur’s neck. Demanded, “What did you say?”

“They’re on their way here,” he said, clear and loud for everyone in camp. Handy, how sound traveled in such close quarters. “And they’re after you, Dutch. Just you. Everybody else is set to walk free, so long as nobody interferes with them taking you.”

That started a rumble in the crowd. A quiet one, packed potential to escalate. 

Arthur knew the sound. Had participated in it himself, once upon a time after a suspiciously timed food shortage on an Atlantic barge. 

It was the sound of mutiny.

(The Pinkertons had promised no such thing and Arthur hadn’t expected to want such a thing, but dead men didn’t revise deals, live ones did, and he’d say what he needed to remain in the latter category.)

Dutch didn’t speak. His eyes had gone blank, his past catching up to him in the span of one breath.

Arthur took the opportunity to keep going. To really drive the nail home.

“If I were them, I’d take the chance and run. After all, this-- all this-- it’s coming to an end, isn’t it? You’re on fumes. Escaping by the skin of your teeth every six months. Some life that is.” Arthur met Hosea’s gaze. Held it, though his thoughts fuzzed out, his gut screaming at him to let go. “And to demand different, Dutch, that’s… You’re signing their death warrants. You must realize that.”

He heard someone say, “Is that true?”

He heard, “It must be. He’s a Pinkerton, but hasn’t caused us trouble yet. Even saved Jack.”

He heard, “All they want is Dutch?”

“This is a warning. We could make it if we left now.”

“How does he even know? He’s been in camp all this time!”

“You want to chance that?”

He didn’t dare breathe, lest he coax the gun to fire early. 

His job was done. All that remained was the most difficult, most unlikely part: him walking away still alive.

Dutch, slowly, took his eyes off Arthur. Looked around, perhaps realizing his folly in the rumbling questions of his followers. 

“Let them go,” he encouraged at a lower octave, just for Dutch, though he knew it was pushing the luck he didn’t have, “and let them live.”

Dutch’s eyes snapped back to him, a fire in them.

Everyone around them hushed, the silence as deafening as their mutiny.

The gun pushed into his chin. 

_There was Abigail._ Next to Hosea, a piece of chopped log in her hands. 

John noticed her at the same time. Full-bodied jerked, as if he knew why she had a log and wasn’t looking forward to her using it. Moved quick to intercept her, as she all but ran forward.

Arthur had no idea what she planned. It struck him as absurd-- and such a thought played out on his face, as Dutch dallied in shooting him to look over his shoulder at what distracted Arthur from his own death.

Thing was, he’d faced death plenty of times. Never before had it included a rageful woman swinging a piece of lumber.

Swing, she did. Right into the back of Dutch’s head.

He crumpled like paper in fire, eyes rolling up. Left Abigail standing over him, breathing hard. 

Arthur stared, thoughts blanked. 

She pushed a hand through her hair, looking around the crowd in much the same, lingering manner Arthur had.

“You heard the man,” she told them. “If people want to stay here and wait to fight a losing fight, fine. But I, and my family, are leaving.”

 

. . .

 

Her declaration broke the silence and stillness. 

Everyone descended neatly into chaos. No knives were pulled or shots fired, but that was the only blessing to be found. Some scrambled to pack what they could, convinced they needed to take the wagons; others simply loaded their horses and went, saying they’d send post under their monikers to Annesburg when it was safe. 

In it, Arthur Morgan went forgotten by all but four. The first, Charles Smith; on being told he should leave with the pack, he told Arthur point-blank that out of the group, he’d prefer to stick by him. 

“I wasn’t joking about the Pinkertons showing up,” Arthur tried to impress on him, but Charles refused to budge. “They won’t kill you on sight-- I hope, but I won’t promise.”

“We can meet again by Van Horn,” Charles compromised at last, seeing Arthur wasn’t budging, either. “You’ll be there?”

“Probably.” Arthur ducked his gaze, demanding as it was. “If the trade-off goes well. Wasn’t lying about my boss not liking me too much.”

“He’ll be disappointed you lived through your harebrained scheme?”

“Greatly so.”

As he had no choice but to gamble on a Pinkerton’s good will, Charles took that. 

“Leave Buell,” Arthur told him, “that horse--”

“ _Bites._ ”

The second and third to remember Arthur: Abigail Roberts and John Marston.

The derisive comment came from John. Both looked harried in their own ways, filled with a restless energy to get out. Inspired and awake, as a rabbit by a cougar.

“Only idiots who don’t know their way around a good horse,” Arthur assured Charles, eyes on John. Charles nodded and agreed all the same, leaving the three to fetch his own things and pack up Taima.

“We’ll see you at Armadillo,” Abigail told him, as if she could declare his future through sheer determination.

“Thank you,” he said instead of agreeing, gesturing awkwardly to the once-leader knocked unconscious on the ground. He needed to get on tying him up. Blows to the head rarely kept a man out long enough to be convenient, and he wanted the exchange with Milton to go as smoothly as possible.

“Don’t thank me just yet,” she insisted. “Wait until we’re out of this mess.”

Arthur reminded her, “I’m not the outlaws here.”

“Hell you ain’t,” John, again. “You don’t belong with the Pinkertons. Not in word, action, or otherwise.”

“This weren’t all luck. My name’s not John Marston.”

“You seeking revenge on anybody else?”

“Weren’t for revenge, either.”

“Then what was it?”

There were a few answers there: for one, the Pinkerton’s offer to clear his name if he brought in Dutch; for another, his lack of employment elsewhere, and his being blacklisted in most books for the work he could do; for yet another, the simple need to _know_ what had become of who he’d once hoped to be family. 

The most likely answer was all of those reasons and none of those reasons.

The one he gave John was, “Thought I’d figure it out as I went. Can’t say I did, but maybe the reason isn’t so important as… seeing how this all finished.”

John gave him a look as if he were an idiot. It wasn’t so undeserved, he supposed.

“We’re fleeing to the four winds, not dying.”

“Never claimed to be a philosophizer. And, anyway, you know what? You should quit asking questions you don’t want the answer to.”

“We’re leaving,” Abigail interrupted, hand clapping on John’s arm as he opened his mouth to keep bickering (his gaze stubbornly away from Dutch and the camp and what had to be his world falling down, though adrenaline and Abigail would undoubtedly carry him away just fine), “which means we need to _go_. We’ll be seeing you, Arthur.”

“Maybe,” he called after them, bemused as Abigail simply raised a hand in good-bye. 

They were waylaid by Uncle and Pearson, who did not look so happy to be leaving-- but would, nonetheless, as others did. 

Arthur fetched himself the worn, dirt-covered rope from his makeshift prison, and tied Dutch well as he could, head kept down. 

To the last, the camp was easy to eavesdrop in. Javier’s disgust with the group was palpable even though he didn’t yell and even as Susan ushered him into a wagon. Sean was loaded onto the back of Karen’s horse, Lenny and Tilly saddling up next to them. Kieran and Mary-Beth stuck close behind the four-- the young and restless, unsure where to go but knowing they couldn’t stay and face down a Pinkerton army by themselves.

“Hey.” Arthur looked up from his rope handiwork to Sadie, her shotgun in hand. He realized then, very abruptly, why no one had _actually_ shot him. It hadn’t been because they were too busy fleeing. 

She asked, “O’Driscolls on the Pinkerton’s hitlist?”

“No,” he answered, not entirely tracking. “They cut a deal a while ago. You’d have more luck with bounty hunting. Nobody minds who takes what job there.”

“But the Pinkertons do know where Colm’s at.”

Technically. Probably. 

But, “They won’t hire women.”

She scowled. “You ever try?”

A pause.

“No.”

A bright, vicious smile. Her fingers tapped on the barrel of her shotgun. “Then I’ll ask, and we’ll go from there.”

“We?”

“Me. With your good word, of course.”

He had nothing to say to that than, “Sure. Alright.”

“I’ll wait with you,” she decided, and sat herself down not too far to do just that. 

Sadie Adler. Not yet on the records. 

Maybe it’d work. 

A few swore they’d regroup and rescue Dutch. Most left, quick as lightning.

None would return for Dutch, Arthur thought. It wasn’t in their blood, just as it wasn’t in Dutch’s. Returning for people was a choice, and a risk, and for very few weighed in favor of being done.

All left except Sadie, who occupied herself with her gun, and the first person Arthur took note of, rather than the other way around.

He sat on the seat outside Dutch’s tent. He hadn’t scrambled to pack anything. Susan had tried to convince him to leave off, but he’d refused. 

Arthur took one look at Hosea Matthews-- the lost look on his face, the conflict in his eyes, the bubbling disdain for Arthur at war with larger disdain for himself- and said, plain and simple from his watch over a bound and unconscious (it’d taken another blow over the head to make him so, which Arthur hadn’t been too hesitant on delivering) Dutch:

“If you reckon to help him, you’ll need to get out of here. The Agency doesn’t know nothing about Mrs. Adler over there, but they certainly know you.” 

“You planned all this. Our wholesale deconstruction.” 

“I did.”

Hosea looked at him, straight-on and silent. Arthur held the gaze. Not proud, but not flinching. 

Eventually, Hosea blew out a breath and turned his eyes away. Looked down to Dutch, lingering long.

“Didn’t betray him any more than he betrayed me,” Arthur said, quiet.

Hosea scrubbed a hand over his face.

“I know.” Those two simple words, and he looked nothing other than old, and worn, and exhausted. “I see that now.”

 _I’m sorry,_ Arthur thought, but couldn’t say. _It wasn’t my home any longer, but it was yours._

Words he didn’t dare say. There was no apologizing for such a thing, no matter how right or wrong it was.

Instead he said, turning his back on Hosea as he did, to make it easier on the both of them:

“You should get out of here.”

Silence. 

“Van Horn, was it?”

Arthur pretended he hadn’t heard him. 

“Take care, Arthur.”

He pretended he hadn’t heard that, either. 

Just repeated, “Get, before I come back to my senses.”

In the distance, he heard Copper’s braying. And, behind that, the thunder of hooves.

Hosea didn’t linger so long after that. Took a leather-bound book from Dutch's tent with the name _Evelyn Miller_ in silver on the side, the camp’s ancient ledger, and a thick iron key from a place too small for Arthur to see. Then he saddled up on the mare that had replaced Silver Dollar, snagged the Count’s lead to get him to follow, ignored the horse’s ear-pinning, snorting displeasure, and kicked his girl into movement.

Slipped away in the forests not a second before the Pinkertons rode in, Copper in the lead and Milton not a tail-length behind.

As predicted, Andrew frowned and clicked his tongue when he found Arthur, whole and hale, to greet him. Even his dislike couldn’t keep him from lightening up when he spotted the infamous Dutch van der Linde tied at his feet and no bloodshed in sight.

Just as ordered. Only took near a year to do.

“Boss,” Arthur welcomed him, spreading his arms out to encompass a camp picked-over and picked-through, abandoned but recently so. Didn’t worry about hiding how gingerly he moved or his wrapped hands, as he knew Milton didn’t care a lick. “About time you showed up. Thought I’d have to carry him down the hill, too, on top of doing everything else myself.”

“Mr. Morgan.” Tight. Grouchy. Yep, he’d definitely hoped Arthur would be as dead as Cornwall wanted Dutch. “I recognize our man, but who’s this?”

“Mrs. Sadie Adler,” Sadie introduced herself, hands still on her shotgun, “pleased to meet you, I’m sure.”

“She helped,” Arthur said. “Now she wants my job. And, frankly, she can have it.”

Milton didn’t dignify that with a response. 

That was fine. Arthur hadn’t expected one, and Sadie didn’t seem the type to take silence as a final answer.

Instead, Milton surveyed the empty camp. Nodded prim and proper and like he wasn’t some glorified bloodhound when he found it, and Dutch’s state, to his liking. 

“You’ll be paid in full when we reach Van Horn,” he told Arthur.

“And my record?”

“Cleared. As promised.”

“This was more work than we bargained,” Arthur said, sudden, “and I think I’d like to renegotiate my reward before I take my leave.”

Milton frowned. 

“Dutch’s gang. They won’t be bothering anybody. But if they do, let them do it under their own name.” 

“I don’t follow.”

“The van der Linde is no more. Strike their names, too, and I can tell you where the missing Blackwater money is.”

The frown deepened. Behind him, his goons - eight or so, none familiar aside from Mr. Ross - exchanged glances.

Sadie frowned, too, at Arthur. Hers was the only one he felt semi-proud in prompting, as it didn’t have the edge of someone who very much wanted to strangle him. 

Also because it showed her extreme doubt on him knowing where the Blackwater gold was, and _that_ was right on the money. 

But, Milton didn’t need to know that.

After a long, considering pause, Milton finally allowed, “We’ll... discuss that possibility.”

“That we will,” Arthur said, giving him a sharp smile. “I’m good enough to ride. I’ll follow you, Mr. Milton.”

“Until Van Horn.”

“God willing,” and oh, how Arthur wished he hadn’t lost his hat back in Rhodes-- he made his smile, fake as any Pinkerton’s, do the work for him, “we won’t be seeing each other again after that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yowzah! happy tumblr purge day, folks; wish I had the nsfw chapter done in time to properly commensurate, but alas. 
> 
> anyway, thanks so much for reading! rdr2 fandom continues to be crazy supportive & beyond chill. find me on [tumblr](https://unkingly.tumblr.com/) (for... now...) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/exkingly) (o god how do u use this i am so old) if you'd like. 
> 
> happy epilogue will be up in the next few days. :D


	6. One and Half Years Later. . .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and thus begins the shamelessly self-indulgent **comfort**. 
> 
> in true rdr epilogue fashion, this became 70% farm simulator and 30% dysfunctional fam doing their best. it also got longer than originally planned and needed to be split into two parts. enjoy!

“We can keep going if--”

“Nonsense. Stay as long as you need. Honestly, we’ve more space than we know what to do with.” Woman’s voice, low and fervent. Familiar. But far-away and watery, muddled by the liquid-hot heat clogging his ears. 

She asked, hopefully not him because he couldn’t rightly say, “What’s wrong with him?”

“Mountain fever. Or so said the doctor.”

“Then he’s not contagious? Good news for us.” 

“I wouldn’t have brought him here if he was. Pretty sure he’ll already be pissed at me when he regains his senses.”

Another low voice. Less fervent. More subdued. 

Charles. 

Of course. Had to be him, because despite his certainty he’d wake up to silence every time he went to sleep, Charles had yet to disappear.

“Is that why it took you two this long to come around?”

“We’ve been busy.”

 _That_ was an understatement. Arthur cracked his eyes open, looking up not to the weathered canvas of Charles and his tent or a clear, star-speckled sky, but a nice, sturdy, wooden ceiling. Candlelight lit the plain room in flickering swathes: a simple dresser topped with books and papers, a chest by Arthur’s side, and the bed, simple and small and smelling not a little bit of dust and mold. Not a hotel, then. A house, maybe, that Charles had convinced the owners to loan them a room in. 

Only one bed in the room, though. Not big enough for the two of them even if they were to stack-- which they’d done before and could do again, if sleeping weren’t their aim for the night. Wouldn’t let him do it with Arthur being so ill, even if Dr. Renaud claimed it weren’t contagious. Dr. Renaud didn’t know Arthur’s sour luck.

Arthur’s feet, which he then realized lacked boots, hung off the end, poking out from a moth-bitten sheet that felt too warm in spite it being so thin.

Concern over his being robbed of his footwear cleared his feverish fog better than he’d like to admit.

“Hey, whoa, Arthur. Stay down.”

“Arthur, please! You just got here. I said you can stay awhile longer.” 

Hands pressed him flat. A moment before he got a grip around one’s wrist and started giving it a twist to get off him, he had the blurry realization that the hand belonged to Charles.

Stopped him from clamping the wrist too tight. Didn’t stop him from wishing ill on his first-born. 

“Shit, let me up! I need my boots.”

Charles frowned at him, a little shadow appearing between his eyes as he looked at Arthur like he’d started speaking in tongues. “Your boots?”

“That’s what I said. Open your ears, Charles,” Arthur growled, not liking how weak his arms felt. He gave Charles’ wrist a harsh tug to make himself feel better over it.

The tugging didn’t help, as Charles’ hands continued to weigh heavy as stones on his chest. He barely glanced down; just lifted one of his hands and pried Arthur’s away. 

From the side, the woman’s voice: “His boots? They’re over here.”

Arthur tried to get a look, but all he saw was the woman’s back. 

She stood outside the room in a little hallway. Had a candle of her own, or so the stretch of her shadow along the wall told him. Water continued to drown her voice out of his ears; it seemed to come from everywhere, pounding all around them.

“Nobody’s stolen your boots,” Charles told him. Slowly. Clearly, with a lot of careful enunciation, like Arthur was some damn invalid. Weren’t his fault he couldn’t hear anything over the storm. 

_Oh._ Storm. Right. It’d been storming. It was still storming.

Sure, fine, okay, except he’d had them on his feet not a moment ago, so if they weren’t stolen-- “Then where’d they go?”

“Over there,” Charles had the patience to move mountains, but also the look on his face that said Arthur was far less impressive than any mountain and so had better catch up or pipe down, “by Abigail.”

“ _Abigail?_ ”

Embarrassingly, his voice cracked on the height it reached.

Abigail appeared over Charles’ shoulder, annoyed amusement writ all over her face. Under the annoyance lurked worry, however, which he, in his haze, thought ridiculous. If she were worried about _him_ , well-- it wasn’t like she could do anything for his sickness. Either it’d take him or it wouldn’t. He’d very much rather it wouldn’t, but he was on borrowed time, anyway.

She looked like she appreciated that approach to life about as much as Charles did.

Which was, not at all.

The boots became a far-away, far-secondary worry.

“Knew she sounded familiar,” Arthur added, lamely, mostly for both their entertainments. Eyes flicking between them, vision still a little hazy, he settled his gaze on Charles long enough to say, “You’d said we were… You said you were taking me someplace friendly.”

Charles said, “This is as friendly as it gets.”

Probably true.

Abigail said, “Near gave me a heart attack, appearing out of nowhere in the middle of a storm like this. Came close to blowing Charles’ clean head off his shoulders when he tried to break the door down with all his knocking and shouting.”

Definitely true.

Charles winced. 

“Thunder had just rolled in. I wasn’t sure if you’d be able to hear me.”

“Thunder’d rolled off long before I climbed out of bed to see who it was. John had just taken Jack out to run errands in Blackwater for Mr. MacFarlane, and here I was, all alone, thinking I’d be murdered by the loudest, lousiest killer known to man.” 

“By the hatchet you were swinging, I don’t think I’d have been the killer.”

“Yeah. Can’t see you going down easy just because your man’s not around,” Arthur chimed in, too, trying to help. 

Abigail sniffed. Said, derisively, though she softened a little at the apology in their tones, “All I’m saying is, you two have the most rotten timing.”

She, like Marston, talked to talk. Had to get all her emotions out, Arthur supposed, lest they pile up and make her burst. 

Apparently feeling she’d talked enough and needed to move, she drew back from hovering over Charles’ shoulder. “Now he’s finally awake, I’ll draw that bath. See if we can’t cool off that fever some.”

“Thank you, Abigail.” Charles drew his hand off Arthur’s chest at last, instead turning around and perching on what scant edge the bed afforded. Still lingering. Still hovering.

Still not entirely minded, as Arthur didn’t feel well enough to protest. 

“Thanks,” he echoed dully, after Abigail had left the room. Then he turned his head away from the door and pressed it against the wall’s blissful chill, grumbling, “Constitution of a bull, my ass.”

“You share a few qualities with thick-skulled bulls, but I’m not sure their constitution’s one of them. We can only hope.”

He hadn’t the energy to get into that one. Said, instead, “How’d we end up here, Charles? Last I remember, we was near Strawberry, and I was doing fine. Doc said I’d make it.”

“Renaud said you _might_ make it. You were touch and go for a while. When I saw you near topple off Buell, I made the decision we were done for the time being.” 

His voice booked no argument. The back of his hand, cool as melting ice, pressed against Arthur’s cheek; Arthur grumbled, but obligingly turned his head away from the wall to let him get a better read all the same. Seemed the least he could do. 

Whatever he felt made the pinch between his eyebrows and at the corners of his mouth deepen.

“This’s a partnership,” Arthur reminded him, his stubbornness demanding he protest, “and we make decisions together. Don’t recall giving you permission to cart me off wherever you like.”

Far as complaints went, it was dumb as hell. He vaguely remembered discussing heading toward New Austin. That he didn’t remember the specifics was telling enough about how bad off he’d gotten.

Yet, Charles humored him. “Saw the storm rolling in. There was no way you’d last while stuck in that drafty tent.”

“Could’ve dropped me in a hotel--”

“We needed to visit sooner or later,” Charles interrupted, pulling his hand back from Arthur’s forehead, “and this is good a reason as any. Wish we’d visited before you stuck a foot in the grave, if I’m being honest.”

Didn’t _need_ to visit nobody. 

He’d caught word of Marston’s newfound residence not through his own sources, but the Pinkerton’s. Ensuring he could keep his promise of letting Dutch’s people walk free meant he’d stuck with the Agency long as he could, filching files and quietly closing cases whenever possible. Hadn’t lasted a full year before he had to _get lost_ or be shot as an outlaw-loving rat, but he’d burnt most of the records and price tags before then.

Regardless of his efforts, there was no helping that John had signed a mortgage for a little plot of land in Beecher’s Hope under his own name. And in _Blackwater,_ nonetheless. 

Stupid, lucky Marston. That he hadn’t been killed through sheer overconfidence or short-sightedness, Arthur didn’t know.

On the lone upside, it had made wiring the prize money from dragging in Dutch van der Linde easy. John paid off that mortgage in no time after that.

Not that Arthur had been keeping tabs on him or his family after then. Not at all.

Charles might’ve disagreed, but Charles hadn’t the stomach or mind for dancing around problems like Arthur did. Thus why it’d taken Charles to haul their asses back into the Marstons’ lives, Arthur supposed. Didn’t mean he had to be thankful for it.

And yet.

“Ain’t the worst.”

Turning back to the wall, he avoided Charles’ eyes long as he could. That turned out to be as long as it took for Charles to put some fingers to his chin and tilt his head toward him. 

The hard knot of apprehension under his sternum loosened under the soft look in Charles’ eyes. Mountain fever marked him in numerous ways, but none so gross as the black, crusted-over rash on his hands and feet. Nonetheless, he felt the need and had to follow; had to reach out, grasp Charles’ wrist in a light hold. 

A small smile traced itself along Charles’ face. The sight gave Arthur no choice but to return it, lopsided and weak though his was.

Outside, the storm raged on.

Constitution of a bull or no, he would’ve had one hell of a fight to win if they’d been stuck in that.

Abigail called from the other room, “Bath’s ready!” 

“You were right. Should’ve visited earlier.” Arthur told Charles, too low for it to escape between them. “Thanks for pulling the trigger. Don’t reckon I ever would’ve.”

“Better late than never, I think.” Charles patted his cheek, a little cheeky himself. Arthur blew out a breath, trying not to linger on how it felt like he was drowning in his own sweat or how shaky his _don’t you dare get too close lest you catch this_ resolve was becoming. “Don’t worry. We don’t have to stay long.”

 

. . .

 

Gray, rain-heavy clouds and muddy puddles marked Jack and his Pa’s return to Beecher’s Hope. 

Ma told him to call it _home_ , not Beecher’s Hope. Problem was, the big house Pa had built was too empty and quiet to be home. Ma didn’t like Jack saying that same as she didn’t like him asking when Uncle or Dutch or Karen or anybody else was coming back, though, so he tried his best not to bring it - or them - up anymore. Pa didn’t care much what Jack called the place, so long as he didn’t stray too far from it. 

Rather than make Ma sad, Jack stopped calling the place anything except _the house._

For being a house, it was fantastic. Although he’d never lived in one before, he knew it was bigger than most, and newer than most, and in general warmer and better than most. He knew it because his Ma and Pa both said so, and also because, unlike their tent or the shack the MacFarlanes rented to them before the house, although it stormed a fair bit, never once did he wake up to water dripping on his head.

If only it could be a little louder, it would’ve been perfect. Jack had thought he was the luckiest kid in the world when he got his own room, but then it turned out that having his own room meant no one was there when he woke up from a bad dream, and also that there was no light from a fire to illuminate the dark when the moon went into hiding and the night grew too silent to be friendly. Then, _despite_ all that horribleness, his Pa expected him to sleep fine alone and to _get out from their room already,_ all because he had his own room!

So, no. Having his own room was nice sometimes, but it wasn’t the best.

When they turned into the road leading to the house rather than Mr. MacFarlane’s where Jack knew they needed to take the burlap and other things they’d picked up from Blackwater, Jack was understandably confused.

“Are we headed to the house, Pa?”

“Yep. We are.”

“But what about Mr. MacFarlane’s things? Aren’t we supposed to take them to him?”

“And we will, Jack, after we drop off those pastries you got your Ma.”

Oh, right. They’d spent so long in Blackwater, he’d forgotten.

Pa had spied the pastries, not Jack, but Pa had a funny way of not wanting Ma to know about everything he did. That was why he often blamed Jack instead. Like when they’d fixed the rotten fence around the property, Pa had said _Jack’d_ done most the work when Jack _knew_ he hadn’t on account of him being most absorbed in a new Boy Calloway novel. Or like when Pa said his knuckles were busted up because somebody had been messing with Jack and needed straightening out, when really they’d just been in town and an awful-smelling man had bumped Pa’s shoulder walking down the street and refused to apologize, and Pa broke his nose and then the rest of his face, and would’ve shot his head clean off if he hadn’t remembered Jack being there.

“But we’re already late,” Jack said, because Pa often needed reminding about obligations. Ma had said so-- said that was Jack’s job when he was with Pa in town, to keep Pa on track. “He was expecting us yesterday.”

“Pastries go bad faster than lumber, Jack,” Pa said, proving he really did need Jack around to keep him on track, because as far as Jack knew, pastries were always good no matter their age. “Drew’ll get his things when we get there. One more day’s waiting won’t hurt him any.”

“Pa…”

“What? You don’t want to see your Ma?”

“Ma’s going to be mad we’re skirting work.”

“Not if you give her the pastries, she won’t be.”

Jack wasn’t too sure about that, but the conspiratorial smile Pa shot him made him feel like Pa was trusting him to be okay with it, so Jack gave him a tentative smile back and decided Mr. MacFarlane _could_ stand to wait a bit longer. The house wasn’t too far out of the way, and it wouldn’t take long to drop off a box for Ma.

And the pastries would make Ma happy. They were her favorites. _And,_ , since as the storm seemed to have lasted forever, Jack did want to see Ma again. Pa probably did too.

Few people ever visited them. Mr. MacFarlane didn’t despite how often they visited him. Pa said that was because Mr. MacFarlane had a lot on his plate with his own house, and also because he was a cagey, controlling old donkey, which Ma had slapped his arm for saying but hadn’t actually disagreed.

The banker Pa got a mortgage with visited once, to see what they were doing with the place in order to _pay it off so quick_. He’d left before he’d spoken more than a greeting to Jack, though.

The house looked a bit more like home based on the extra horses hitched to its front post and there being _three_ , not one, persons sitting out on the porch. Helped too there were two dogs, not just Cain, lazing in a puddle.

It especially looked more like home as Pa drove the wagon closer and the three people resolved themselves out to be not Ma and some strangers, but Ma and _Charles_ and _Arthur._

All thoughts of getting their job done right fled from Jack’s mind. He hopped off the wagon nearly before Pa pulled it to a stop, yelling an excited, “Ma! Charles and Arthur are here? When’d they get here?”

“They arrived just last night,” Ma told him, laughing as he rushed the closest - Charles, who stood up to intercept him - and was swept up into a hug. “Be careful, Jack. Arthur’s sick and can’t move so fast.”

“Not so sick I can’t give him a hug,” Arthur said, then _oof’_ d as Jack barreled into him, his arms just barely catching him in time. The kitchen chair he sat on creaked ominously under them, which made Jack picture them breaking it under their combined weight, which of course set him to giggling. “Whoa! Alright, hey, you’ve gotten bigger, Jack! Wasn’t expecting that.”

“Not that much bigger,” Jack said, “you’ve just been gone a long time.” Then, looking down to the hands patting him gently on the shoulders and the sheen of sweat he had going despite doing nothing but sitting in the porch’s shade, “What’s wrong with your hands? Why’re they all splotchy and gross?”

“Jack, be nice.”

“Like your Ma said, I’m sick. Better run on before you catch it. Don’t want your hands to look nasty as mine, do you?”

Jack, making a face and empathetic _ewww_ , clambered off his lap. Thinking Arthur must’ve arrived with Charles, he quickly went to check Charles’ hands for sickness, too. Bemused, Charles let him, wiggling his fingers at Jack when he pulled on a few to _make sure_.

“How was Mr. MacFarlane?” Ma asked Pa, who had stopped the wagon and walked toward them, lingering by the porch’s front steps. He didn’t have the pastry box in his hands, which Jack thought dumb, since that was the only way Ma wouldn’t be grumpy at his answer.

And yet he answered, “Still have to go see him.”

Ma frowned, just like Jack knew she would. “Weren’t his deliveries due yesterday?”

“What, don’t want help with the company?” 

The tone invited Ma to a fight. Hearing it made Jack drop Charles’ hands and hurry down the steps to say hi to Copper, too. Always best not to be caught in the middle of Ma and Pa when they were in moods like that.

True to form, Ma’s tone went hurt and cold. “ _John._ Is that really the first thing you want to say?”

“It’s alright,” Arthur said, sounding quite unruffled. “Not entirely undeserved.”

“It isn’t _alright_ ,” Ma insisted.

“I--” Pa started, then stopped. Paused. Took a big breath. And, for the first time _ever_ , started again, sounding _nicer._ “No. I, uh. Charles. Hi. Been a while.” 

“I’d say so.” Charles sounded unruffled, too, like Arthur. They clearly hadn’t spent enough time around Pa, because if they did, they would’ve realized just how rare Pa sounding nicer _was._ “Hey, John. You’re looking well.”

“Doing well. Could say the same about you.” Another pause. Then, voice more stilted: “Morgan.”

Jack looked up from Copper - who was almost too excited to see Jack again, as his paws were full of mud and Jack’s trousers weren’t until after he’d greeted the dog - to catch Pa nodding at Arthur and Arthur staring back. 

After a while, Arthur nodded, too. “Marston. Got a nice place here.”

“Thanks to you.”

“Don’t know what you mean. Didn’t build this house like I heard you did.”

“Know it was you who wired the money.” Pa’s voice went odd, like when Ma had told him they were close to having enough money to build their own barn. A mix of happiness and fear, except Pa was never afraid and only occasionally happy. “Came from Dutch’s prize money, didn’t it?”

Chair creaking as he did, Arthur leaned back. Like he was settling in for a nap, though he watched Pa with the same keenness Cain watched the bobcats that wandered through their yard. 

Arthur said, “Figured it could go to some good use here. More than it would’ve sitting and tempting me, anyway.”

“Should’ve sent it back,” Pa spat. “Blood money. Told you, Abigail.”

Arthur shrugged. “You could’ve, but seems too late now.”

“What’s it matter?” Ma bristled. “No way were we affording land on what we were making, John. Speaking of, maybe you should go deliver those supplies for MacFarlane. Charles and Arthur will still be here when you get back whether you like it or not.”

Pa glared and scowled at his boots. Looked stuck in too much thinking, as Ma said.

As Jack knew the _real_ reason they’d stopped, he could answer Ma where Pa didn’t. 

“We picked up some pastries for you, Ma,” he said, pushing Copper away to stand up -- and immediately having to pat Cain’s head, too, as Cain felt left out from his attention to Copper. It made him all distracted, but he could still say, “We stopped here first to drop them off for you.”

Saying they _both_ picked up the pastries felt better than saying just Jack did. With how Ma’s face immediately lost its anger, Jack knew he was right on that.

“Oh.” She blinked, her hands tangling in her lap. “Is that right? Pastries?”

“Danishes. The cheese ones, like you like. Enough for all of you,” Pa said, sounding like Jack did when he didn’t want to eat his vegetables, “if you split ‘em up.”

“Nice of you to offer,” Charles said, though Jack couldn’t tell if he meant it or not. Probably did, by the look Charles gave Arthur when _he_ stayed silent.

“Pa said they’d go bad if we waited any longer,” Jack informed them, thinking this bit critical to the explanation.

Ma looked amused at that, which told Jack he was right about pastries never going stale, too. “That’s what he said, is it? Five hours would make all the difference? Well. Must be some pastries.”

Pa’s glare softened, and he looked up from his boots. 

“Wouldn’t want to chance it,” Ma continued. “Where’d you say they were? Imagine we’ll have to eat them now, while they’re still good.”

“I’ll get them,” Pa said quickly, moving back to the wagon. “I-- I’ll get on to Drew’s, drop all this stuff off. You fellows… make yourself comfortable, I guess.”

“Thank you,” Charles said, nudging Arthur in the shoulder when he mumbled something like, _don’t worry, was planning on it._

Louder so they could all hear him, Arthur said, shifting in his chair and only looking a touch awkward, “Thanks. Abigail here’s not given us much an option.”

Ma rolled her eyes, her amusement official and sticking. “Your fever _just_ broke. I’m not having you ride out and die because you’re too stubborn to stay still. Think about the trouble you’d cause Charles if he had to take the time to bury you.”

Arthur raised his eyebrows toward Charles; opened his mouth, only for Charles to interrupt with, “I would not ‘just feed you to the giant catfish,’ Arthur.”

“Why not?” He sounded offended. “Lot less trouble for everybody.”

“Figure you’d give the catfish indigestion, is why not.”

“Said if _I_ died, not if _Marston_ died.”

“Not even here a full day,” Pa grumbled, returning from the wagon with the white pastry box in hand, “and I’m already getting made fun of. Here, Abigail.”

Ma had a fond smile on her face as she took the box and thanked Pa. She grabbed his hand before he turned away, pulling him down for a quick peck on the cheek.

“I’d still have to haul you over there,” Charles continued, easy as if they hadn’t all been almost-arguing a moment prior, stepping over to prop his shoulder against the post in front of Arthur, “if it even exists.”

“Oh, it exists. Saw it drag in a fisher and swallow him whole.”

“Same as you saw a disk big as a horse and bright as Saint Denis fly through the sky?”

“You saw a _what?_ ” Pa asked, straightening up from Ma and shooting Arthur the same look he gave Jack when he caught Jack lying about having fed Cain his table scraps. “How drunk were you?”

“He swears he was completely sober,” Charles deadpanned.

Arthur hunkered down in his seat, chin set near to his chest. “Never should’ve told you about that.”

Jack couldn’t believe his ears. Had Arthur really met aliens? After all-- “One of my books had a disk like that! It said they were aliens, like from the moon.”

“Thanks, Jack,” Arthur said, eyeballing him with weary amusement. “See? He’s heard of them before. Not so outlandish now, is it?”

Corner of his mouth ticked up, Charles snorted and shook his head.

“Travel safe,” Ma told Pa. Both of them were smiling as well, giving Arthur their own expressions of disbelief. “Get back soon. Charles was going to hunt us something good to eat tonight.”

“I’ll be quick as I can,” Pa assured her, and gave Charles and Arthur a little, not-as-stilted nod before heading back to the wagon. 

That night, the house was far less quiet and empty. Charles and Arthur -- the latter of whose fever returned with a vengeance in the evening, half-way through supper -- took Jack’s room to sleep. As that meant he got to sleep in the living room in front of the fire with Cain and Copper, _and_ could hear soft talking from his parents’ room until he drifted off, losing his room really wasn’t so bad. Less alone than before, Jack slept better than he could remember since leaving the camp.

For the first time since they’d moved in, Beecher’s Hope started feeling like a real home.

 

. . .

 

The morning after saw the sun back on an unclouded horizon. John woke with it, as the light streamed in the bedroom window and directly into his eyes. Although sneaking out of bed without waking Abigail wasn’t a terribly impressive feat, he felt good about it all the same. 

Typically, a morning meant him putting on the coffee pot, having a mug’s worth, and then getting the horses ready for Abigail, Jack and him to ride to MacFarlane’s. What made this morning different was him walking out of his bedroom only to nearly trip over Cain and wake Jack, who was _sleeping in the living room?_

Right. Arthur and Charles were in Jack’s room. So Jack was out here.

Though he’d built it with the help of MacFarlane’s ranch hands, the house hadn’t always felt real. Or if it did feel real, it didn’t really feel like _his_ , or his family’s. It felt a bit more like his with Jack sleeping a room away and the knowledge that more than just the three of them were in it. 

It especially felt a bit more real when he took the coffee pot, his and Abigail’s mugs, and headed outside, meaning to stoke the outdoor fire and boil the grounds there, only to find Arthur on the porch stoop. Curled at his side was his damned dog -- who’d started greying at the muzzle, John noticed. Copper lifted his head and wagged his tail twice at John’s arrival, then went back to dozing. 

Eyes red from stress and skin sallow from sickness, Arthur looked back at him for a moment before - as John hoisted the coffee pot and quietly closed the door behind him - he nodded and turned back around, mumbling a, “Good morning.” A cigarette stuck out the side of his mouth, a thin wisp of white rising from it in the thin early light.

“Morning,” John greeted back, and then walked right by him. 

The outside fireplace was not too far from the porch. Thoughts fuzzily attached to the idea that he could deal with Arthur _after_ his coffee, John set about making it in silence. 

Miraculously, Arthur let him be. Just watched him with vague interest from the stoop as his cigarette burned down.

He’d let Charles’ horse - not Taima but a brilliant white Arabian mare, small but clearly powerful and well-bred - and Buell off the hitch to graze at what sparse grasses Beecher’s Hope provided. John’s Old Boy, long reclaimed, grazed a bit away from them. John watched them rather than stare at Arthur as his coffee brewed. When it finished, he poured himself a cup, then poured the cup he typically left for Abigail and offered it to Arthur.

Perhaps seeing it as the peace-offering John partially meant it as, Arthur took it with a quiet thanks.

After warming himself with the mug and a few sips and beginning to dread rather than enjoy the silence, John roused himself enough to talk.

Said, first, “Didn’t know if you’d make it.”

Arthur hummed, a non-committal sound from the back of his throat. “Fever weren’t that bad. Charles overreacted.”

“Not the fever.” Though John didn’t believe Charles overreacted as much as Arthur though, given how near-comatose and sweat-riddled he’d been by the dinner’s end. “Annesburg. Weren’t sure you’d make it after everybody left.”

A short, telling pause. Arthur’s eyes flicked to his, then away.

He said, “Could say the same about you.”

“Nah. I’m lucky, remember?”

Arthur snorted. He put his elbows on his knees, hunching forward.

Said, with a lingering glance across the dry, rugged, beautiful bit of land they’d put their stake on, “That you are.”

Sensing he was being made fun of, John bristled. “It’s good land. Just has some untapped potential.”

Arthur gave him an odd look. “Calm down, Marston. I wasn’t ruffling your feathers. Really, this place’s great. You could raise a good family here.”

“Already got a good family.”

“Yeah, you do. Like you said,” Arthur looked away again, back to the land, fed up in some way John couldn’t track, “lucky.”

It wasn’t easy as all that, John wanted to snap. It wasn’t all luck. MacFarlane had near cut him and Abigail loose three times in the last two months, mostly due to John’s temper taking itself out on bumpkin locals in Armadillo and the plains. Only kept them on because John had yet to bite the hand that fed them, but it was just a matter of time. And if they were let go, if they had to sell and move-- or _worse_ , if they really started their own ranching business and _then_ John’s mouth or fists or who-knew-what-else fucked them over, got the law on their tail like Abigail always worried- he didn’t know what to do. Didn’t even know if ranching was what he wanted to do, just knew that it was the only clear path left that didn’t mean returning to life on the run. 

He didn’t say all that, though. Would’ve been too raw to. The thoughts scalded his insides; he couldn’t imagine how they’d feel if Arthur tossed them back in his face.

Instead, he scowled and said, “It’s not all luck, you know. We worked hard to fix this place up. Might’ve started because of your blood money and _good word_ , but only reason we’re still here is because we put time and effort into it.”

“I know,” Arthur responded, like it was easy as that.

“You don’t,” John snapped, blood rising.

“I know you and her been working hard,” Arthur said in that damned unflappable tone of his, “and that you’re trying your best to make the most of it even though it’s nothing like you knew before.”

That _did_ sound spot-on. It resonated deep in him, and inspired a whole new level of anger.

He set his coffee cup down harsh enough for liquid to slosh over the sides, distantly proud of himself for not just throwing it like he wanted to. Copper’s eyes opened, the sharp sound waking the dog.

“Sure, you _know._ How in the world do you _know_? Once an outlaw, then a Guarma coconut farmer, then a Pinkerton, now a-- what? Traveling busybody? You don’t _know_ the half of what it takes to put down roots and raise a family, Morgan.”

He had Arthur’s full attention. He took the burnt-out cigarette from his mouth and snubbed it in his half-drank coffee, then set the mug aside. Took off the deep-brown, lightly scoffed hat that had replaced his ratty black one and set that aside, too.

Swayed to his feet. John eyed him as he did, not liking the height Arthur had him any more than he liked the sight of his pretty mug turning his way.

“It’s five-forty in the fucking morning, Marston, and I just got done feeling like some piece of shit that Copper chewed on and threw up for four days straight,” Arthur said, low and brimming with violence sudden and swift and sure, “not to mention your boy is sleeping in that house but I reckon your wife soon won’t be, and you got work today. You _really_ best think twice before picking a fight with me.”

“Fight wouldn’t take long even if I did, old man. Looks like a stiff breeze would blow you over.”

“Yeah? Don’t reckon I’m the one who’s spent the last year sitting on his ass and getting soft.”

Much later, John would realize despite all his fancy talk, Arthur was fixing for a fight, too. He’d think it darkly funny how quick their tempers flared. He’d linger on how gratifying it felt to throw a punch and have someone _hit back_ , not with intent to kill but just to get a point across where words failed. Before then but later still than the moment-of, John wished he’d appreciated Arthur understanding the need. It wasn’t bloodlust, not really. But it still lurked under his skin and in his blood, itching like a barely healed scab. Hot and painful every time John scratched it, never an ounce better than the last; hot and painful, yet John couldn’t _stop_ scratching it, lest it stick in his skull and festered for days on days.

He’d never hit Abigail or the boy. Hit them both with worse than fists, sure, his mouth big enough to stick the whole of his foot in it every week, but never like how he swung at Arthur, cracking his knuckles against his square jaw. 

(Only a matter of time until he fucked up that record, too, he thought. Feared. Wondered.)

Irregardless, those were realizations for later.

In the moment, he fought, tooth and nail. They toppled quickly from the porch to the yard’s dust, fighting dirty as any barside brawl. Ended up giving Arthur a black eye and fair bit of abdominal bruising from a few well-placed knees and elbows. Ended up also pinned with his ears ringing, Arthur’s arm around his throat and squeezing hard. 

Broke off only when the door crashed open and Abigail yelled at them to _knock it off! Good god, what is wrong with you? John!_ \-- which Arthur did, immediately letting go and backing up, and John did not, took the opportunity to scramble to his feet and shoulder-check Arthur to the ground.

Charles intervened soon after that, pulling Arthur - who’d flipped them in short order, the well-trained _bastard_ \- off. Copper’s barking filtered into John’s awareness around then, as well as Cain’s responding howling from inside the house.

John next saw Abigail’s frustrated, near-tears eyes. Saw the damage he did to Arthur as the man spat blood from a split lip, his rumpled clothes dusty and red-speckled, the clenched fists at his side saying he was ready for more. Charles, behind him, looked close to letting him go for it, his expression dark as the storm that had just rolled off.

Of course, Abigail laid into _him_ , not Arthur, over causing such a ruckus so early in the morning. She demanded how he could do that to a sick man, and when he didn’t have a better excuse than _Morgan started it,_ she laid in to him about how often he still picked fights, like some halfwit bully who didn’t know how to control himself. 

Arthur said something like, “Weren’t nothing, Abigail. We was just talking and tempers flared. We’re good now,” but she would have none of it.

“You don’t have to live with him, Arthur! Whenever he goes off alone, do you know how much I got to worry whether he’ll finally pick the wrong fight and never come back?”

She then turned again on John and demanded if this was how he was always going to be. 

He didn’t want to hear it.

He didn’t need to take it.

He didn’t know how to possibly answer honestly besides saying, _yes, and there’s nothing either of us can do about it._

So instead he snapped, “I’m going for a ride,” and turned on a heel, kicking sand into the crackling fire as he stalked past it to Old Boy. Snagged the horse’s lead and pulled him to the fence wherein he’d left his saddle and traveling gear, saddled him up, and rode out of there, fast. 

On his way out, he couldn’t help glimpsing Jack’s face through the house window. 

The neutrality, _guess it’s just one of those days_ -esque expression he found there only made him leave faster.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay tuned for the final chapter! and as always, thanks for reading. :D


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **warning:** please mind the tags! nc-17 content below.
> 
> last chapter, my word(s, many words, how did this get so long, wow)! it has also been **edited** as of 12/23 with slight (non-story) changes. please enjoy!

When John'd left, he heard Arthur calling for him to stop and come back. Not Abigail or Charles. Charles, because he probably felt it wasn’t his place; Abigail, because she knew him by now. Knew he needed the time to cool down.

That understanding, that she _had_ to understand to deal with him, made him feel sicker than sick. It drove him to Armadillo and kept him there for a full day.

Then a day turned into a week, and he thought he saw Buell on the horizon. So he moved to Tumbleweed. Then south, to the border and across it. Took bounties and odd jobs, and looted a few who thought to try their luck against a lone rider. And so a week turned into a month, and a month into two, until he woke up one day behind a two-table tavern in a little nowhere town called Wooley and knew if he didn’t go back right then he maybe never would.

Old Boy had gained a few scrapes on their travels, but remained faithful the whole journey. Once they reached Armadillo, the horse’s ears pricked up and he moved a little quicker than John thought necessary.

All the same, they made the trek back as dusk fell. Stopped at MacFarlane’s to ask if he still had a job despite running out like a coward. Drew told him he did on account of Mr. Smith and Mr. Hawk filling in while he was gone. Then added, his lip curling in pure disdain, that if he _dared_ run off like that on his wife and child again, he could kiss any chance at being welcomed back good-bye. 

Bonnie, a spitfire he’d grown to enjoy the company of, didn’t look too hot over seeing him back, either.

“You do this often, John?” She asked him. “Abigail acted as if you did. Makes me wonder how many of those days you missed you’d actually been sick, and how many you’d spent gallivanting around the west.”

“I’m working on not,” he explained, wishing it didn’t taste so much like an ugly excuse.

“Huh.” Flat. Unimpressed. “Your boy’s only eight, you know. Still needs his pa around.”

_I know_ , he thought, miserable. Said only, “I’m headed back, aren’t I?”

She turned away from him, dismissive in a way she hadn’t been before. Said, “Guess that’s better than some,” while clearly thinking Abigail and Jack deserved better than _some_.

They could both agree on that. He bid her good-bye and got himself moving before the guilt drove him back.

He rode into Beecher’s Hope after dark. The house’s main room’s lights were on, casting squares of gold on the land’s dusty dirt and wild grasses. In the big tree out back, an owl hooted. Coyotes, farther off, yipped. 

Even at night, Beecher’s Hope really was a beautiful spit of land. 

All the more fool he, leaving it for so long.

He hitched Old Boy to the porch, somewhat concerned the horse would be spooked and race off without realizing the fence marked the end of where he should run. Buell and the white Arabian laid passively a ways away, trusted with not jumping the fence. Both had been asleep until John clattered in; at his arrival, the two got up and trotted farther off, Buell giving John what he _swore_ was the horse equivalent to the stink-eye.

“I see you’re still no treat,” John muttered at Buell as he finished looping Old Boy’s lead around the post. “Good to know not everything’s changed.”

The door to his house opened. Arthur Morgan, dressed down in jeans and a faded blue shirt, boots covered in barn muck, stepped out.

Behind him, Abigail hovered at the doorway.

“Hey,” John called to them, head ducked. “Listen. Abigail, I’m sorry for running out on you.”

“You done?” Arthur asked him before Abigail had a chance to reply, his voice strung tight and his boots planted on the porch’s top step. The house’s light made him into a broad, gold-lined silhouette, as if he were a picture cut and pasted into the world.

John lifted his head enough to glare, baleful. “I appreciate you hanging around and helping out, Morgan, but--”

He didn’t finish the _but._

He didn’t finish because Arthur started down the steps the moment he started talking, pulled back a fist, and decked him straight across the face.

The force sent him stumbling back and then flat on his ass. His mind whirled. Dust swirled around him.

Arthur advanced, one fist clenched and cocked back. The other reached down and yanked John up by the shirt front until they were face-to-face, Arthur’s lips twisted into a snarl.

“Should shoot you right now.” He shook John, tightening his hold in John’s shirt when John got his wits back enough to grab Arthur’s, too. “Running out like that. Thinking you can waltz back with some wimp-ass apology. I should shoot you dead.”

“Arthur,” Abigail called, “don’t. It’s okay.”

“It ain’t.” Arthur’s fist wavered in the air, like he was trying to figure out whether he wanted to deck John another three times or if he wasn’t even worth that much effort. “Dutch might not’ve practiced what he preached, but he had it right about traitors. World would be a whole lot better off without men who run out on their families over _nothing_.”

“I get it, shit,” John protested, weak even to his own ears, “and I’m sorry, alright, I am. Know it were wrong of me. Whole reason I came back--”

Arthur punched him, again. Hard. Made his teeth rattle.

Let him drop, too. Stepped back, still brimming with anger.

“If it weren’t for her still believing in you, _god knows why,_ I’d’ve killed you, John Marston. Mark that.”

He spat to the side, rubbing the back of his hand over his mouth afterward. Seemed to try, with much difficulty, to keep himself from laying into John.

A large part of John wanted him to. A smaller part felt keen relief at this; at being held to some standard, even if he were lacking; at being made accountable, when everyone else tended to just be so relieved he’d shown up again that it was like he hadn’t done something wrong in the first place. Behaviour like that made the guilt build so high in him, he never thought he’d get away from it.

Arthur eyed him critically. John wondered if the relief was on his face. Wondered if he much cared whether it was.

Whatever Arthur saw, what he said was, “Don’t matter if you came back after you left so damn long.”

Then he turned on a heel and marched back into the house. His house. Abigail’s house.

Abigail, who looked at John like he’d broken her heart twice over and yet she found herself loving him anyway, took a few steps toward him. Then paused. Stepped back.

Said, “Dinner’s on the table if you’re hungry. I’m… glad you’re back.” Then, as if drawing on some extraordinary courage however easily she usually yelled at him, “But he’s right. I can’t keep doing this, John. You need to either stay or go.”

She hesitated again, not-so-pretty words sitting on the tip of her tongue.

Eventually, though, she shook her head, gathered her skirts, and headed back inside. Left the door open after her, which was how he saw her settle down at a nice dining table that he didn’t remember them having, Jack at her elbow and careening his neck to see John. When they met eyes, Jack ducked his head back to his dinner. 

That she left the door open was the sole reason he managed to pick himself off his ass and head in. 

If he hadn’t, he knew that would’ve been it. He’d’ve been gone. And that-- being alone, not being with them _forever_ \- that was worse. Far worse. 

Arthur wouldn’t look at or speak to him when he grabbed a bowl of stew and sat himself on the solitary empty chair at the head of the table. Charles gave him a nod of acknowledgement and mentioned off-handedly they had cold steak cuts in the ice box for bruises, but otherwise kept to himself, too.

Abigail had a frown on her face and worry writ deep in her forehead. She tried to start conversation, but it fizzled out swiftly as she obviously fought with herself over being outright angry with him and heart-wrenchingly grateful he’d returned.

The silence would’ve been oppressive if Jack didn’t ask where he’d been. But he did, and John managed the courage to answer him honestly. 

“Can I go to Mexico?” He asked his mother, all smiles. “I want to ride a donkey and wear a big hat!”

“No, it’s not safe,” she said, sharp. Then, softer, as Jack’s excitement shifted into hurt confusion, “Okay, maybe one day. The border’s always closer than I think it is.”

Jack cheered back up at that.

Charles asked, “Did you run into Javier?”

John blinked at him. “If he’s down there, he didn’t want me finding him.”

“He left there a bit ago,” Arthur said, though he kept his eyes glued to the table. “Joined up with Macguire and Summers’ little posse, instead.”

“Sean and Lenny run a posse?” Abigail asked, bewildered. 

“More like Macguire and Jones run a posse. Summers curates their ideas. Heavily.”

“Right.” Charles sat back, gaze put to the ceiling as he thought over whatever intel he and Arthur apparently ran. “Sean, Karen, Lenny. They’re small time and fixing to stay that way. Kieran joins too, sometimes, ever since Colm swung and his gang fell apart.”

“Colm? There’s a name I haven’t heard in a while,” Abigail said, pensive.

This was all news. Although his face stung like a kick in the teeth by a horse, he didn’t risk getting up for a cold press or pain tonic and potentially missing what they had to say. For the first time in weeks, he actually felt interested in the people around him. “Where’s he other times?”

“With Mary-Beth.” Charles’ smile went lopsided on that one. “She, Tilly and Susan run this high-society book circle. She’s the writer, Tilly works the press, and Susan’s management, although the other two claim she’s just there because the day she stops harping on somebody, she’ll realize she’s been dead five years and finally keel over.”

“They’re doing well, too,” Arthur said. “Last we heard, they were pulling in a lot of money.”

Abigail _huh_ ed. “All legal, too? Wow. If I’d known there was money in books, I would’ve worked harder on my reading.”

“What do they write?” Jack asked, excitement renewed.

“Nothing for you,” Charles said, quick. And, just as quick as Jack’s face scrunched up in unhappiness, Charles coughing and talking his way through a laugh, “Because it’s… so boring. Really dry stuff. All about dresses and skirts, and things like that.”

“Oh.” Disappointed, Jack deflated in his chair. “Why do people like it? That sounds dumb.”

Arthur snorted. “Lot of dresses involved, alright. Plenty of undressing, too.”

“Arthur! And you read them?” Abigail, grinning. “Were they any good?”

Arthur put up his hands. “Whole reason I read them was because they kept mailing Charles saying he had to--”

“Not just that.” Charles deadpanned. “They wanted me to write a review.”

“-- And he couldn’t take time out of his busy hunting schedule to do them the favor. So I read it, told him what happened, and he mailed off my review under his name.”

“Finally got them to stop mailing about it, at least.” With a vague, near fond smile. “Had some business we needed to take care of, quietly. Hard to be subtle when the pony express keeps finding you and shouting your name from a mile away, no matter where you head.”

Shaking his head, Arthur’s shoulders at last lightened up a notch, the topic chasing off the day’s demons. “Jackson refuses to let us know how she kept tracking us. And I know it’s Jackson; reckon she’s getting a kick out of showing us up.”

“Or a kick out of pestering him.” Charles shook his head, amused. “Personally, my money’s on Sadie telling her, since she ran the same area as us for a time. But she won’t give a straight answer about it, neither.”

“Oh! How’s Sadie?” Abigail asked. “We really haven’t heard from anybody. Not even to know if they were alive.”

“She’s alive,” Arthur said, mouth twisting down in unpleasant memory. “That’s about all we can say.” 

By how poorly she’d adapted after everything in the mountains, that wasn’t too surprising. 

Because it was still unfortunate, John said, “Damn shame. She was a good woman.”

Acknowledging him for the first time, Arthur nodded to that. Then shrugged, though more at what had come of Sadie than John.

Charles looked between the two of them. As did Abigail. 

Without calling more attention to it, Charles added, light, “She’s a right demon of a bounty hunter. Acts like she’s got a death wish.”

“Does, I reckon,” Arthur muttered between a bite of stew, sounding as if he understood and didn’t blame her a bit for it.

“Probably,” Charles said, a little distant and a lot less convinced about the sentiment’s merit. “Pearson’s doing great. He’s running a shop out of Rhodes. Think Uncle’s with him sometimes, but he moves a lot. Reverand’s the same— could never pin him down, though last I heard he was re-joining a church.”

“How do you know all this, anyway?” John couldn’t help but ask. “Doesn’t sound as if all those folk wanted to be found.”

Charles shot Arthur a look. When Arthur didn’t even meet it, Charles frowned but said to John, “Agency was still keeping tabs. We spent the last year reminding them they had no reason to.”

At that, Arthur spoke up. “All over now, though. Agency would have to try real hard to bother you people.”

A quick, small smile. “We made sure it’d be a pain in the ass, alright.” 

“With all that done, have you two decided if you’ll stick around? Put in the order for that pre-cut barn last week. The lumber should be ready for pick-up tomorrow.”

From Abigail. She poked and prodded at her stew as she asked it, her voice faux-light. 

Then she looked up, pinning not John but Arthur with her gaze.

(That, more than anything else, brought home to John just how bad he’d messed up.

Later, in the dark of his bed - his big, familiar bed, his wife sleeping not a hand-span away, though she’d turned away from him and refused to talk once in - seeing her look to Arthur and not him put in him the resolve to stay and make that right. Whatever form _right_ took, he’d make it happen.)

Charles looked to Arthur, too. He was clearly more on board with sticking around than the notoriously wanderlust-filled Arthur Morgan.

Charles said, “Going to take more than two pairs of hand to build that.”

“With all the prep we’ll need to do before we bring in cattle or horses, there’s no paying Drew’s ranch hands to help again.”

Arthur couldn’t hold Abigail’s gaze. He dropped it in seconds, practically burying his head in his stew to stave off having to answer. But then she said _that_ , and before John’s eyes, the man’s resolve crumbled. 

He said, quiet but sincere, “Wouldn’t hurt. Since you’ll be needing the assistance. Not like we’ve got anywhere we really need to be.”

Abigail’s face lit up. She snagged his hand on the table and squeezed it, startling him into looking at her. 

Startled a smile onto his face, too. Real soft. Real gentle.

Arthur’d beat his face in, which didn’t explain why all the air felt squeezed from his lungs. His mouth went dry, his blood ran cold.

Abigail glanced at Charles and then John and, seeing his face, pulled her hand back so swiftly he could see the caught-out guilt in its wake. Cleared her throat. Stood, abruptly, the chair’s legs squeaking across the floor.

“I’ll start dishes,” she declared then, and gathered whose plates were empty.

Mind threateningly blank, John dropped his eyes to his own half-full bowl. Couldn’t think, but didn’t speak. 

Suddenly, he didn’t have much an appetite.

 

. . .

 

The first night back, John didn’t ask.

The second night, Arthur broke his silence in favor of hounding him like John were some sort of cross-eyed crook caught sneaking into _Arthur’s_ house, riding his ass over his every decision about the barn while Charles and Abigail watched on without intervening. John still didn’t ask.

The third night, when Arthur continued to dog him and Abigail didn’t say a thing, he asked.

There was a bit of him that realized then that after everything, after all his running off and heckling and fighting and generally being a terrible husband, Abigail would always be there for him. Whether she should or shouldn’t wait for him, she _did_. Time and again. Her fidelity lasted long enough he’d started taking it for granted. Now that it hung in serious jeopardy-- with Arthur and her both acting like it _didn’t_ , like nothing’d happened between them even though something clearly had-, he got to re-evaluating. And once he got to re-evaluating, he got to _dwelling_. He dwelled as long as he could ever dwell on something.

And that was why on the third night of them going to bed at the same time without talking or looking at each other, their room cold as ice for reasons besides the incoming-winter chill, he couldn’t bite his tongue any more. He had to ask. Had to take the ugly elephant lurking in the corner of their room outside and put a bullet between its eyes, even if it meant what fell on him after might crush and kill him.

“What happened?” He asked Abigail. Him, seated on the bed, back to her; her, already in bed, covers pulled up to her chin and eyes shut. Both of them were in their nightclothes, 

“What happened with what?” 

She already sounded irritated at him interrupting her attempt to sleep. He felt in his bones that this wouldn’t be a good conversation. Would’ve been better to keep his trap shut and, if that wasn’t good enough for him, then leave for real. Would’ve been easier for her, and him, and Artur, probably.

Of course, he couldn’t actually leave off. Not like that. Not with her.

“With you and Arthur. What happened?” He meant to stop there and let her answer, but once he’d started, he couldn’t just _stop._ “I get it. I mean. I sort of get it. I was gone, you didn’t know if I was coming back--”

Behind him, the sheets rustled and the bed shifted. Her sitting up, staring at him. He could picture it without even looking. 

She said, her offense thick, “I knew you were coming back. Just didn’t know when.”

Irritation rising over her making this difficult instead of just _admitting_ , he barreled on through. “Wouldn’t blame you for seeking--”

“John Marston, don’t you dare imply what I hear you implying.”

“But it’s true, ain’t it? You and Arthur--”

“He has been nothing but a _perfect_ gentleman to me while you decided to go play outlaw!”

“Then what’s with the glances? And you, always giggling over what he says. Always smiling. He’s not _that_ funny.”

“Just because I’m getting along with him don’t mean I’m-- _John._ Are you being serious? I can’t believe you’re being serious. You think I would cheat on you?”

“Don’t see why you wouldn’t, is all.”

“Did you cheat on _me?_ ”

“What? No!”

“Seems you had more opportunity while gallivanting around than I did.”

John snorted, derisive. Drawled, sarcastic to the last, “Oh, sure. Tavern whores really compare to Arthur Morgan sleeping every night not so far down the hall.”

Abigail went quiet.

Quiet enough and long enough John twisted himself around to see her. Found her not looking away as he expected, but looking straight on to him, her face screwed up in a strange expression.

“Yeah?” He snapped, unnerved. “What’s that look for?”

“Do you fancy him?”

Heat colored his ears red. 

“Why would I? He’s an ass. A lying, two-timing hardass. Don’t know what tricked Charles into running with him, but it obviously weren’t Charles’ fault.”

“Huh.” Her strange expression went stranger. Almost like she was curious, though he had no idea what she was on about. “For you, that’s practically a compliment.”

“You fancy him,” he accused, turning the tables uneasily and maybe desperately.

“Sure. So does Charles.”

“Hah, right. That’d explain them sticking together.”

“More that it was a happy bonus, or so I’ve been told.”

John laughed. Stopped when she didn’t laugh along. 

Stared.

Abigail stared back, her eyebrows up in challenge.

“There’s been nothing but thoughts between Arthur and me,” she said, slow, like he needed it all spelled out. To be fair, it appeared he did. If he thought back and squinted over their interactions as they worked on the barn-- them working better than brothers, like they were a two-headed beast that also gave each other lingering looks and maybe brushed hands more than necessary- _well._ Actually. He didn’t have to squint so much. It fit.

“Charles know?” John asked, feeling more than a little out of his depth. 

“That we fancy each other? He’d have to be blind not to.” John accepted the double hit of _you ain’t been around_ and _you’re dumb as a donkey with love_ implied therein. Abigail continued with, her voice going lofty and haughty in a way that meant she felt real insecure over what she was saying, “We talked about it. Once. Maybe twice. All three of us, I mean.”

Another beat of silence.

John forced out, shrinking down, “That right?”

“Decided not to do nothing or say nothing more about it until you came back.” Abigail smoothed her hair back, nerves not-so-carefully hidden. “That was my stipulation. And Arthur’s, until a month passed and he became sure you weren’t going to show.”

“Smart man,” John mumbled, “to cut losses clean and easy.”

“It weren’t easy. He saw how you leaving ate me up.” Now, finally, Abigail’s eyes dropped. Down to her lap, where she put her hands and tangled her fingers together. The sheet had rumpled around her waist. “He argued for you at first, you know. Told me I was expecting too much change too fast. Said fellows like he and you don’t do normal well, and that you was trying at all showed how much you loved me and Jack.”

“Got us so figured out, doesn’t he?” 

Derisive, with a scowl. 

But he had it right. Damn him.

“I didn’t take that so well, I’ll admit. Almost threw him out on his ear the second time he brought it up.” A quiet huff. “That’s another thing you two have in common. Don’t know when the person you’re talking to doesn’t want to listen and just shut up.”

“To be fair to us, you don’t often want to listen, Abigail.”

She scowled at him. He put his hands up, palms out, and gave her his cheekiest grin to tell her he was joking.

(Mostly, anyway.)

“Anyhow. Drew’s probably glad you’re back, even if he hates you for running out on me so long,” Abigail continued after a moment, her scowl easing into a small, wry smile. “You started trouble in town. Arthur started trouble on the ranch. Seems he don’t do so well taking orders.”

That was-- heartening. Enough so that it made John almost smile. “Him, needing to be top dog? There’s a surprise.” 

“Last week, just before you came back, he got into yet another spat with the foreman over something stupid and petty. Arthur not putting the milk jugs in the right crate, I think it was? Don’t really matter what started it, just that their brawling knocked over the barn lantern and near set the whole place on fire. Drew was so mad, I swear he was going to call the sheriff and get Arthur hauled off to jail. Think it was only my saying he and Charles were the ones providing for Jack that kept him from it.”

It was John’s turn to go quiet, then.

Quiet enough long enough for him to say, when Abigail glanced up to him with caution and concern both over how he was taking her story, he managed to not only meet her eyes but say, “Sorry. For running out. Really.”

Her worry eased out. She said, “I know. But John, I’m serious, I can’t--”

“I know,” he said, so she didn’t have to. She nodded to her lap, her arms wrapping around herself. Turned herself small. Seeing it, John really, really wanted to eat a bullet. “I’m… trying. I’ll try better.”

“Most I could expect of you, I suppose.” Dry and watery at once. “Don’t know why I still love you.”

“Don’t know either, but I won’t be telling you different.” Then, on the heels of that, needing to know: “We’re good?”

She nodded again, giving him a narrow-eyed side-glare and lopsided smile both. “We’re good.”

“Even with you fancying Arthur?”

She guffawed. Loosened up her grip on her arms to reach out and give him a weak, playful shove. “John! You always manage to ruin the mood.”

“Didn’t know there was a _mood._ Anyway, I’m being serious!” 

“ _Yes_ , even with that. And with you fancying him, too.”

“I--”

“Remember, now, I always know when you’re lying.”

His mouth closed with a click.

She gave him an expectant look. When he waited her out without saying more, she rolled her eyes and said, “Alright. That’s enough emotional talk for tonight. Let’s sleep.”

“Sounds good to me,” he said, relieved beyond belief.

He blew out their night candle. They climbed in under the sheets, the bed warmer than it had been since he’d gotten back. Maybe even warmer than before he’d left, though he wasn’t too sure he wanted to dwell too long on those thoughts. He had enough to linger on without piling on more.

Precisely because his thoughts refused to turn off, he stayed awake a long while, staring at the ceiling. 

Eventually Abigail turned over, very quietly. But herself closer to him, though they weren’t often the sort for skin-to-skin sleeping. In any case, he knew her sleeping sounds like the back of his hand, and she exhibited none of them.

When his thinking got too loud and her not being asleep stoked his stupider impulses, he broke the night’s quiet and asked what felt safest to learn. The absurdity that it was the _safest_ option wasn’t lost on him. 

She replied immediately and without a touch of sleepiness. So her thoughts kept her as awake as his did his. That was somewhat gratifying.

“What’d you all decide you’d do when I came back, anyway?”

“We’d talk about it.”

“About what, exactly?”

“Let me rephrase. _We’ll_ talk about it.” When John rolled to his side and made to argue that, she held up her hand and put a finger to his lips. “Tomorrow. After Jack’s asleep.”

Well.

If he’d been hoping knowing would quiet his mind, that particular answer had the opposite effect.

_Great_ , he thought, resigning himself to a night of wondering and a day of sleep-deprived misery.

 

. . .

 

True to Abigail’s word, they talked in the morrow after putting Cain and Copper out with the horses and after tucking Jack in to his bed, his bedroom door firmly shut. Charles and Arthur had long moved into what used to be their storage room, their bedrolls conspicuously close, basically made into one bed except one side looked a lot more worn than the other, Jesus _fuck_ how had John missed that. Anyway, they got out drinks, and talked. 

Then they did a little less talking and a little more drinking.

Then they did a little less drinking and a little more acting.

Charles hadn’t eyes for anyone but Arthur-- _no offense meant, Abigail, John_ ; _er, no offense taken?_ \- and no patience for their on-off squabbling even when they were agreeing. He turned in early, citing him developing a headache over John whisper-arguing with Arthur about _bad taste_ and how he, John, was at once the best and worst a person could catch.

Arthur trailed him like a puppy to their room’s doorway. Tipsy if not drunk and the room’s atmosphere light and open from all the exhausting talk, he fumbled a grip into the back of Charles’ shirt and hauled him around for a good-night kiss that lasted far longer than any could without leading to more.

What it led to was Arthur putting his head into the crook of Charles’ shoulder and, by how dark Charles’ face turned, doing something interesting with his tongue and Charles’ neck. Which seemed to be just fine for Charles until his eyes re-focused over Arthur’s shoulder, spotted John openly staring, and he clammed up, all _shy._ Said, voice an octave below his usual baritone, “Excuse us. Just be a moment,” and stepped back into his room, Arthur half-tripping, half-snickering after him. The door shut soon after that.

They took more than a moment. Remarkably, aside from the occasional thump of what John supposed was a body part against the hardwood floor, no undue noises made their way out. Habit borne from a life that didn’t look so kindly on their practices and tastes, _maybe_ ; them being too busy with their mouths to make much noise, equally probable.

The knowledge of what had to be happening, noisy or no, seemed a good reason as any to keep drinking. 

If asked if he hid in the bottle to soothe his nerves, John would deny it under pain of death. Unfortunately for him, Abigail didn’t need to ask to know what he was up to. She left him to his devices for a bit, leaving him alone with his beers to change into her nightgown. When she came back to him working through his second bottle in under four minutes, she looked at him with fond exasperation and, when he defensively asked, _What is it? You’re staring,_ sat herself on his lap. The new kitchen chairs were sturdy things, but the wood still groaned under their combined weight-- and then tipped, too easy, when Abigail leaned herself on him and tilted his head up with a few fingers on his chin and said, between one kiss and the next, “Relax already. Nothing’s going to change.”

That was _very wrong_ , he thought. Things were going to change. Things were going to change a lot when they’d already changed plenty, and that wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

The change started with John and her near spilling on the floor as his chair tipped back to two legs. She muffled her laughing against his shoulder as he scrambled off, scooping her up into a bridal carry because it was easiest and also, possibly, most natural.

“Floor?” He asked her, mostly joking, his anxious thoughts blessedly derailed by her good mood. “For old time’s sake?”

“Absolutely not!” An affronted whisper-huff, cautious even while drunk about waking Jack. “We have a perfectly fine bed, and I intend for us to use it. I will not throw out my back just because you like living rough.”

“But you’re alright with throwing out your back for other reasons?”

“Don’t flatter yourself; you’ll have to do actual work before you can dream of-- _John_! You scoundrel.” A louder, surprised laugh at his hoisting her up and burying his face into her chest. She shoved at the top of his head to get him to back off, her legs kicking uselessly in open air. In the end, she got a full look at his idiotic grin. Warm delight lingering in her voice, she chided, “Stop! Bed first.”

“Bed it is.”

Bed, it was.

He carried her there because it made her giggle like they were teenagers again, and because he’d forgotten how much he liked the weight of her, and because of a thousand more reasons besides, each sappier than the last. She bounced when he dropped her on the mattress, her smile blinding and her eyes even brighter. She hastened to scoot herself to the headboard, flapping her hand all the way at him to _go close the door-- oh! But leave it open a crack, just a bit-_ , which he did. She told him to get rid of his shirt and suspenders but to leave on his _little neck ribbon_ , which he did but not before telling her that it wasn’t a ribbon, it was a necktie, and it was all the rage in Mexico.

She gave him a flat, amused look. “If that were true, Javier would’ve had one. Now _there_ was a man who knew how to dress.”

A little hurt but mostly amused, John asked, “You don’t like it?”

“Dear, I love it.”

She crooked her fingers and bid him over to the bed. He did, all too happily.

That was how Arthur found them. Abigail, back against the headboard, a hand buried in John’s tangled mess of hair. John, nosing between her thighs, nails scratching light down her sides. _Quiet_ wasn’t their default, but they’d learned to make due in a camp with burlap walls and then, later, with an easily-woken child sleeping down the hall: Abigail kept a hand to her mouth, and John-- kept his mouth occupied.

Distracted as such, John wouldn’t have known Arthur arrived except for Abigail’s legs tensing around his head ( _too soon_ ) and her dropping her hand from her mouth to wave Arthur in closer.

Unlike John, he didn’t go as easily. Instead he hovered by the now-shut door, looking a special mix of having recently experienced the tumble of his life and like it’d tumbled him right to a cliff edge (and not in a good way). He still had his clothing on, socks included, though his rumpled shirt had lost a top button and his pants were undone. When John pulled himself up from Abigail and glanced back, he recognized two things: one, Charles had let him go before they finished; and two, _Arthur_ looking awkward and out-of-place annoyed him more than anything he’d seen in the last four days, and _that_ sure was saying something.

“What are you waiting for?” He bit out even as he shifted himself to cover Abigail and get himself closer to her mouth. “Get over here. Ain’t that the whole point of that horrible talk we just had?”

Arthur’s eyes narrowed. Whatever came after that, John didn’t linger to see, having a much more interesting thing - namely, kissing Abigail - to focus on. She indulged him, sliding them lower on the bed and dragging her nails up his back, though not without a little, sighing _John, behave_ noise to kick them off.

Behind him, clothing rustled and dropped to the floor. The bed dipped, its springs squeaking.

Despite all the warning signs, Arthur’s closeness startled John. Startled him when he spoke, and when he set a broad hand lightly between John’s shoulder blades.

“You ever stop running your mouth, Marston?”

Abigail tipped her head to the side, both to put her lips at the side of his jaw and to say, “Only if you make him.”

“Naturally.”

John’s scowl made Abigail scoff and flick his shoulder. Then she got a look in her eyes like she had an _idea_ and before John could head her off, she turned her attention on Arthur and tilted her chin up like a challenge and said, “So? Make him.”

Apparently Arthur didn’t mind following _that_ order. John turned his head to see how Arthur interpreted Abigail’s ridiculous idea, only to be caught half-way in a teeth-clattering kiss. Arthur tasted like cheap beer and the hard candies Charles favored, and he kissed like he was ready for a fight. Had a hand in John’s hair before he knew it, tugging a fistful of strands too-sharp and too-tight until John tilted his head the way Arthur wanted. Meant he had to crane his neck up and hold on to keep his balance, torso twisted until he got his legs on either side of Abigail’s waist. Abigail, for her part, ran soothing hands down his front and then worked to undo at his pants’ fly. 

That presumed control of Arthur’s inspired John to growl a mean, “Went from being a snake in the grass to strong-arming your way everywhere, huh,” as he bit hard on Arthur’s bottom lip, his fingers digging like claws into the man’s shoulders.

“Either way seems to get the best of you,” Arthur snarled back, words a harsh rasp. “Not too difficult to pull a fast one on our Johnny boy.”

Oh, _fuck_ no.

“John, don’t!” 

Abigail tried heading him off, her hands clamping down on his hips as she felt the bunch of his muscles and new tension humming through his body; but too little and too late, as John surged up and knocked Arthur, who hadn’t expected him to move so fast, sideways onto the bed. 

Straddled him and put hands around his throat for a blink until Arthur threw a ( _weak_ ) fist into the still-healing bruise that made up his cheek. Grip loosened and subsequently lost, Arthur flipped them-- and so they crashed from the bed to the floor, Arthur with his whole weight landing square on John’s back, his legs pinning his arms and his hand shoving his face flat.

If they hadn’t woken Jack or attracted Charles’ attention, it would’ve been a miracle.

(It turned out to be a night of miracles.)

“Goddamn, you are a piece of fucking work,” Arthur snarled close enough that his breath against John’s ear sent a shiver down his spine even as the stench of alcohol made his nose scrunch. “Use your words like a normal person, John. You actually want me here or _not?_ ”

“Get off me,” he snapped back, trying unsuccessfully to buck him off. John had speed on his side; Arthur had size. In their position, Arthur came out on top.

“That’s not an answer.” Arthur pulled back. Settled his weight over John’s tailbone. Made it easier to breathe, which John took as an opportunity to do just that.

“Arthur,” came Abigail’s voice from out of view -- the bed --, not scared but careful. Attentive. Ready to intervene, he was sure. Touching, and while help he wouldn’t mind getting in another case, here, it was undeniably embarrassing. “Are you hurting him?”

“No,” Arthur replied immediately, his tone struggling to return from the pit of anger John had dragged him into. “Not more than I’m starting to think he wants me to, anyhow. Is that right, Marston? You want somebody to beat sense into you?”

Put that way, it sounded stupid. Foolhardy. 

“Always think you know what folk want and need, Morgan.” John tried for a glare. It sort of worked, though he could only get one eye on Arthur at a time. “Fuck you.”

Arthur scrutinized him the same as he did after he’d knocked him flat. A critical look-over. Dissection, where John was some half-interesting, half-disgusting bug.

He was breathing a bit rough, John noticed then. They both were. 

Abigail hovered at the edge of the bed, her eyes moving fast between them. She had one hand to her chest, though her expression was a war between concern and her own brand of hurt anger. She hurt to look at, especially as the concern won out over the anger; and so, John put his gaze back on Arthur.

Arthur, who said, quieter and less aggressive and still greatly annoyed:

“You want a brute? I can be a real brute. But we’re gonna sit here like a pair of idiot infants until you tell me that’s what you want, ‘cause otherwise, I might just be tempted into rearranging your ugly face for scaring your woman so bad.”

Immediately, John broke his own rule and looked back at Abigail. 

But she didn’t look scared. Abigail never looked scared. 

Of course, neither did she look happy. If anything, under the pissed off worry, she looked defeated. Like she’d come to expect this of him and was getting close to waving the white flag on trying to pull him out of it. Seemed three days hadn’t totally erased his running off. 

Except, _no_ , it wasn’t just that. It was a lot more than his running off.

As his brain worked through such thoughts-- his adrenaline pushing through the alcohol fast as it could, which wasn’t fast as he’d have liked--, Arthur let up on his head. Took his hand back and smoothed his hair back from his face, the short brown strands quickly falling back in front of his eyes. He didn’t look too fond of John either; and, for the first time, John wondered if Arthur really _wanted_ a fight, or if he’d just been seeing himself where he wanted to.

“Can we trust you to be nice? Or you gonna bite again?” He asked John, patronizing as ever.

But a real question lurked under there. 

To the real question, John said, the fight in him dimming but not gone, “Don’t be gentle with me. Know you’d leave me for the wolves if you had the chance.”

“Naw.” Arthur let up on his arms. Leisurely, as if making some show of his strength that John wasn’t sure he entirely disapproved of, he levered himself off John and back up to the bed. “Abigail told me how you got them scars. Wolves wouldn’t have you.”

“Can you two not say a single nice thing to each other?” Abigail asked then, her relief palpable as the probability of murder in their bedroom rapidly decreased.

John turned himself over and sat up, eyeing Arthur. Perched on the bed’s edge, Arthur eyed him back.

Arthur said, “I like your ribbon.”

John said, “You’ve got nice eyes. -- Did you say ribbon?”

“Isn’t that what it is? Looks like the sort you find on fancy gifts. Little dirtier, I guess.”

“It’s a necktie!”

“Says who?”

“All of Mexico,” Abigail said, her tension bleeding out of her as she decided they weren’t in danger of killing each other and so flopped back on the bed, “says John.”

Arthur squinted skeptically at him. Rather, at his necktie.

“John,” Abigail called as if sensing John about to launch into an explanation for how he wasn’t lying, it really was a fashion statement, even if he’d been told so in a language he barely spoke, “please get back up here. Talking to the floor is really strange.”

“Was hoping we’d finished talking,” he muttered as he climbed back up and into the bed.

Watching him from his spot on the edge, Arthur echoed him. “That, I can agree with.”

Abigail never let him touch her when they argued. Really argued, not just debated or bickered or bantered. She wouldn’t let him touch her after they argued if they hadn’t reached a conclusion or any other time either of them had an active grudge against the other over whatever nonsense ticked one of them off, either. It hadn’t always been a rule, but once she got pregnant with Jack and named him the father, she never budged on it. It had to do with how she’d been treated when she’d worked nights, he knew-- but, as a nineteen year old who never _stopped_ arguing with her and also firmly believed in sex’s power to overcome all disputes, it frustrated the hell out of him.

As a near-thirty-year old, he had just enough wisdom to appreciate it. Meant that when she snagged him by the arm and pulled him in for a kiss, it always felt like coming home. Even when his head remained clouded and cotton-filled and his cheek throbbed something awful, the rush from grappling with Arthur hollowing him out as it left, being skin-to-skin with her gave him some ground to put his feet on. Let him focus.

Words had never been his thing. Being with Abigail like this assured him not only that words didn’t _have_ to be a thing, but that what mattered had already been established: they weren’t mad at each, not really, and whatever problem they might’ve been facing, they’d face it together. And if sometimes his anger wasn’t at her but at himself, or the day’s work, or their lot in life, or the world at large-- she tried to help and sometimes getting lost in her worked, but she was just one person. He needed to figure it out himself. He knew that.

If knowing that made how he didn’t have to be as mindful and put-together with Arthur into something simpler and cleaner and sorely desired, well. He forced himself not to linger on it while kissing Abigail.

(Damn, but he wished he’d drank more. Served him right for jumping into bed at the first chance after two months without.)

She must’ve noticed his distraction, but she didn’t call him on it. Instead she put them back to square one: a hand at his nape, keeping their lips sealed, and another hand snagging his and dragging it up to her breast. He palmed it, and settled heavy between her legs when she opened them for him. Swallowed her little noise of pleasure when he pinched, twisted, tugged; rolled his hips when she tightened her thighs around him.

The nineteen-year-old in him found it easy to get his head, so to speak, back in the game. Abigail was familiar. Safe. Easy when they matched moods, and they were definitely matching moods. 

Like coming home.

Problem was, the rest of him had yet to realize he was home to stay.

She took it slow. Ran her hands up and down his back, pulled back from the kiss to mouth at the smooth dip between his ear and jaw. Caught his earlobe with her teeth and gave it a gentle tug.

He shivered.

Then he startled, as a new, much larger hand smoothed along his side.

“Whoa. Easy.” 

Arthur, seated on the edge of the bed, torso twisted to let him pet along John’s side.

John’s lip curled on reflex, ears going hot. It wasn’t that he’d forgotten about Arthur, he’d just-- been focused.

_Thing was,_ Arthur confused him, alright. Everything with Arthur was _confusing._ From when he’d shown up just to hassle John to him sending them Dutch’s reward money to--

“Careful, John. You’re thinking loud enough to wake the dogs.”

“Arthur,” Abigail chided quietly, though John felt her smile against his neck, “if John’s got to be nice, so do you.”

He hummed low in his throat, like he was contemplating it. 

John raised his head from Abigail. Opened his mouth. Drawled, “Yeah, Arthur. Watch yourself.”

Abigail huffed. “How old are you, John? -- Oh. That works.”

Following her advice, Arthur kissed him to shut him up.

True to advertisement, it worked. Without rattling his teeth, too, or jarring his bruise; Arthur met John where he was at and stole what breath he needed to keep mouthing off.

Under them, Abigail made a curious sound that wasn’t as displeased as John’d thought she’d be. After all, this was, what-- his second kiss? And she’d had none?

John started wondering vaguely about that as Arthur shifted closer, shuffling onto the bed proper on his knees. He stopped wondering about it when Arthur tilted his head and deepened the kiss, teeth set lightly on his tongue and cheeks hollowed out as he sucked; at the same time as when Abigail reminded him about his half-mast interest by rolling her hips and digging a heel into the small of his back, forcing him closer. Meant he became twisted in an awkward position, but his back was the one thing he _wasn’t_ too worried about ruining throughout the night.

His pride, the night would definitely ruin that. There was no salvaging it, though part of him wanted to try.

Kissing Arthur was nothing like kissing Abigail. Aside from the obvious prickly stubble - fuck, was that what Abigail had to deal with in kissing him? - where Abigail was smooth, there was where Abigail teased teeth, Arthur bit. Where Abigail went slow, Arthur sped up. Abigail coaxed him into following her. Arthur simply set the pace and expected him to keep up.

When they broke apart, both breathed hard. Arthur wasted no time in putting his mouth to John’s shoulder and kissing along here. Worked one hand over his chest, flicking a nipple and half-chuckling when John just flinched away, face screwing up. Weren’t his thing, was all. Just felt ticklish. 

Arthur got the hint and left off, his hand instead settling on Abigail’s side. He licked a hot stripe up John’s neck and then nipped at the necktie, tugging it with his teeth. Though cloth, the necktie had little give. John grumbled a complaint about Arthur stretching it out-- and so Arthur let it go and instead bit his shoulder, skin rolled harsh between his teeth. John shivered, again, electricity buzzing from his head to his fingertips, his toes curling.

“Jesus,” he breathed out, more shaky than he wanted to be, “warn before you--” 

The warning was in how Arthur wrapped his hand in John’s hair and pulled his head to the side before adding another mark below the first. Oh, and it’d mark; it’d definitely mark; his necktie would not be enough to cover a whole pattern of marks.

Given his pension for open-necked shirts and that he’d told MacFarlane he’d help on the ranch in the next two days, he should’ve minded more than he did.

“Fuck, that hurts,” he hissed at the end of the third.

Arthur huffed a warm, amused breath against it, then gave it a little kiss. “Too much? Thought you said--”

“Didn’t say _too much_ ,” John said through grit teeth.

Another one of those rumbling hums. Arthur traced the shell of his ear with his teeth. His hand, he flexed almost absent-mindedly in John’s hair, his nails scratching lightly at his scalp. Felt nice, especially in contrast to the throbbing ache his neck took up.

Throughout, Abigail set a nice, steady, rolling rhythm with her hips. Heat-- lot of heat. Without Arthur trying to take pieces out of his neck and shoulder, it grew much more distracting.

“Abigail,” he questioned, figuring he made his point alright when he pushed her gown above her waist and smoothed his hands down, down, to -- heat, nice and slick. 

But all she said was an absent, “Hm?”

She had a hand on Arthur, he saw then. Pushed his pants and shorts down at some point, just enough to get his cock out. Maybe the reason Arthur kept tugging and gentling John’s hair, and had set his cheek against John’s head, his weight leaned in toward theirs. His shoulder, pressed to John’s. Abigail’s spit-slick fingers, featherlight in a way John knew could drive a man insane, stroked up and down his length, stopping only occasionally to rub along his crown’s slit before dipping down. The muscles in Arthur’s thighs and stomach jumped every time, his body barely convinced it should keep still. Arthur had better enjoy her while she was being nice; she could keep up something that slow for near an hour without letting a man tip over.

She was a fucking tease. Little nice to know John wasn’t the only one who struggled under it.

He felt all sorts of good when her rolling rhythm stilled when he got a hand between them, fingers dipping into warm folds and brushing, rough, over her clit. Pushed back the hood, stroked the hardened nub; felt her clamp her thighs hard around his hips, her head snapping up from her pillow.

He smirked.

She scoffed, head dropping back down. “So pleased with yourself. As if we haven’t been sleeping together for far too long. Listen well, John Marston; if you _didn’t_ know how to please a lady, I wouldn’t be hanging around.”

“Is that all I am to you? A warm bed?”

“Sometimes you carry in the bathwater, too. Mostly for your own baths, though, I’ve noticed.”

Arthur’s hand curled, tight, in John’s hair at the same time as Abigail’s words turned airy. Her hips canted up as John crooked his fingers right, two slipping into plush heat and his thumb rubbing slow circles around her clit. Her ass put delicious pressure on his trapped erection, her legs spreading a bit wider to accommodate him.

She moved her hand faster on Arthur, too. Tighter at the base, loose at the end. Just enough twist in the wrist to make his hips jerk.

“Arthur?” John asked, because he knew it was the worst time to do so, “You still with us, old man?”

His scalp stung as Arthur twisted a fistful of his hair and tugged. Made him chuckle, knowing he’d hit his mark.

“Don’t know how you’re always so pissed off,” he said, his mouth back at John’s neck, teeth not a threat as much as a promise, “with a lady like this waiting around for you.”

“Ooh, I’m a _lady_. Been a while since I’ve heard that.” Abigail preened, even as she ground down on his fingers. “Take note, John.”

He told Arthur, “You let me know if you still think that by the morning.”

As he predicted-- Abigail’s tastes were nothing if not consistent-, just as Arthur’s breathing turned a little ragged and he stopped bothering to keep from thrusting into her hand, she let go. Placed her hand on his chest instead, giving him a light push back when he forgot himself and swore over it, raising up on his knees. The long, low hiss of a fervent _fuck_ was one John knew quite well.

Abigail had her head tilted back, her bottom lip caught between her teeth and her breathing deep and carefully measured. She opened her eyes, dark and blown, to send Arthur a not-at-all ashamed smile; and then focus on John, her hand snapping down to grab his wrist. 

“Alright,” she breathed, a tremor in her words and a ripple along her stomach when he stopped the quickened caress of his hand, “alright, if you want to-- hurry up, John.”

Didn’t need to tell him twice.

“You could get behind him,” he heard her tell Arthur as he worked himself out of his pants with no little difficulty, “he likes, hm. An arm. Around his throat.”

“He likes being choked?” 

Arthur really should’ve been more surprised, John thought, at the same time as he was glad he wasn’t. 

“Mmhm. His tastes have got a theme, as you can see. Or, you could--” and a silence, wherein Abigail presumably made a demonstrative gesture, because she was apparently a fount of ideas for what Arthur could do to him.

“Maybe another time,” Arthur replied, voice abruptly tight.

Which of course made John want to know what they were talking about. He turned around as he shook off his last pant leg, frowning at the two he found staring directly at him.

“Fair enough. Teeth’s more a concern with your equipment, huh.” Her entertainment over imagining whatever she’d concocted clear, she nonetheless relented. “I will say, he’s good with his tongue.”

“Sure,” Arthur said, voice again stilted. He seemed relieved she didn’t fight him.

John’s frown deepened. He had an idea what she’d proposed, then.

Somehow, it’d never occurred to him. It certainly was… a thought. An idea. An image.

“John.” 

Propped on her elbows, gown hitch to her waist and legs opening, Abigail not only broke his wandering thoughts, but stole his full attention. _Really_ , he didn’t need to be told twice. 

She greeted his return with a chaste kiss, her arms looping around his shoulders as he leaned over her. He ran his hands along her sides once, twice. Pressed his head into the crook between neck and shoulder, peppering what skin he found with old adoration. As she lifted her hips and he lined himself up, he breathed in the faded firewood smoke of her hair. Breathed out long and slow when he sank forward to the hilt, her hitch of breath quiet and unforgettable in his ear. 

Like coming home.

He took his time in moving. Not long, in truth. A few seconds, maybe. Held off until she squirmed under him and tapped her hand against his shoulder. When he stalled even more by kissing under her chin and tickling her with his scruff, her annoyed huff was pure warmth and affection.

A lot went unsaid between that moment and the next.

_I’m still hurt,_ for one, from her. _You left me. Again._

_I’m sorry,_ again, from him. _I’m trying._

What she told him was, “You’re smothering me,” not so much ruining the moment as moving it toward something lighter. 

Something that let him sit up and pull her with him. She braced herself on his shoulders, then on his arms. Bit her inner cheek as she shifted and settled, adjusting to him. He put his hands on her hips, thumbs rubbing circles there.

Eventually, she gave warning with a minimal nod, and started moving. Lifted herself up, to the tip; slid down, quicker. 

When the bed shifted behind him, John didn’t startle. Arthur settled behind him as if he’d been waiting for them to smooth out their reunion; probably had, knowing him and how he took in everything before committing to _anything_. 

The uncontrollable fire from earlier rekindled, fed by weighty feeling that grew in the room’s quiet. John smothered it best he could, roughly wrangling his thoughts to the _present_ and _nothing else._

In the end, they rearranged enough to put Arthur’s back to the headboard. He could hold himself and John up plenty fine, he said, but falling off the bed was enough of a mood-killer he’d rather avoid the possibility altogether. Abigail clung to John as they shifted around; started moving again immediately once they settled down, little circles and thrusts of her hips that rocked him back into Arthur.

Arthur, who had his legs on either side of John, and the hard, hot line of his erection pressed against his backside. Who added another bruise to the unmarked side of John’s neck, his pressure starting light and ending heavy and turning John’s insides into jelly. Who he wrapped an arm around his throat right after, his mouth set right next to John’s ear.

“Tap twice when you need air,” Arthur murmured into his ear. “I’m trusting that you will.”

Waited until he snapped, “Fine, _fine_ , I heard you,” before he put a hand over his mouth and nose, pinching the latter and blocking the former. 

Of course, because reflex was a bitch, John tried to take a breath and couldn’t. 

Not a typical thing Abigail did, saying she hated how it made him struggle. She stopped at an arm or hands around his throat and pressure on his windpipe, which didn’t last near as long or feel quite as good. It wasn’t something John pushed; with all else she offered, one itch unscratched didn’t really matter.

Abigail had paused her movements on Arthur’s murmured instruction, _her_ chest heaving. She watched John’s face with something like fascination and something like curiousity; watched until John’s hands pulled off her waist to grip Arthur’s arm, watched until John’s eyes squeezed closed and most likely after that, too. 

The burn started in his chest, burning under his ribs. Traveled up his neck and down his arms. Put his feet and legs on fire, the same as if he’d jumped from snow into a hot springs.

When his thoughts started falling apart, he tapped Arthur’s arm, twice.

He let go and lightened the arm around his throat, and John gulped air, opening his eyes to Abigail, whose expression said she wasn’t sure she liked what she saw but not enough to tell him to quit.

“There you go.” Arthur’s voice, thick as a wool blanket and deep as a well. There he went again, petting at John’s side like he were some sort of dog. Had to be coated in sweat, but Arthur didn’t seem to mind. “Breathe. We got you.”

“I’m fine,” John growled, or tried to; it came out as a cough.

“‘Course,” Arthur agreed, easy. “Ready?”

No hesitation. “ _Yes._ ”

Again. Throat. Mouth, nose.

The burn came faster, him not having taken the time to catch his breath. 

Abigail beginning to move again stoked it. At first, she just shifted her weight back and forth, almost experimentally; but then she caught his eyes and whatever she saw made her pick up the speed, bracing herself on his knees. Arched her back perfectly, and Jesus _fuck_ he’d never hated her nightgown more.

He couldn’t help squirming when she started goddamn bouncing, her knees squeezed in tight on his hips and her head tilting back, eyes shutting. The urge to touch her struck him, the thought as fire-hot as the near-pain in his lungs. Instead, he dug his fingers into Arthur’s arm, pulling at it uselessly, not wanting but _wanting_. Ground back against Arthur, enjoyed the unfamiliar drag and dampness, made Arthur hiss in his ear--

He tapped twice.

Arthur let up. John breathed. Coughed, eyes watering.

Barely calmed his coughing, and Arthur put a hand over his mouth and nose again. His other hand, he wrapped around his throat. No longer a chokehold. More promise than threat.

Made him _writhe._

Suddenly, Abigail shifted forward. Toned her movements down to quick, erratic jerks, her breath heavy. Tilted her head to the left-- and Arthur shifted forward, met her over his shoulder, their kiss sloppy and lingering.

Made John figure out why they hadn’t done so before, as his anger spiked like nothing else. Behind it — its source — burned a want, a longing, a feeling like they could have it all. Without the energy to protest his anger banked, left him adrift in his longing, for them and them together, the focus off him so he could just exist and not worry about messing up— and, more immediately, focus on the simple need to breath. 

Two taps.

“Shit, fuck,” were his first words, him sagging forward into Abigail a brief moment before being pulled back flat to Arthur’s chest. Every piece of skin felt overheated, the whole of Arthur a brand on his back. “God _damn_ it.”

“Think he likes it.” 

“How d’you figure?”

The first, Abigail. She hadn’t stopped moving, her hips canted forward and grinding down into him hard, the pinch between her eyebrows telling him she wasn’t far off. Good news, as neither was he. The mid-crisis urge to touch her returned, though it was as paperthin as the rest of his thoughts. All the same, he got a hand on her chest and rolled the peak between his fingers. Slid the other hand again between them. Felt the hard, liquid-hot nub and crooked his fingers.

She bowed over him immediately, a moan slipping from her throat. Pecked him wetly on the cheek, whispering nonsense praises and one sincere, weak-voiced _missed you, John_ into his ear. 

Cut herself off after that to put her mouth back on Arthur’s. Then shuddered, a full-bodied tremor, and gasped, tensing up all at once before turning loose and pliant.

The tightness made his toes curl. Built up a different kind of fire just below his stomach, put him on the edge--

“Off,” he warned Abigail, “please,” who knew better than to hesitate. 

But then, _fucking hell_ if her lifting off and falling down on her side of the bed didn’t knock him a step back. Took himself in hand to chase the orgasm, only for his hand to bump into another’s. 

Arthur’s. Sun-tanned skin lighter than John’s, though not by much. A half-dozen calluses on his hands, each catching more than the last. Without thinking, John thrust up into their joined hands. Tipped his head back to Arthur’s shoulder, breathing as fast as if Arthur had just let him go. 

The phantom pain in his chest took him back to the edge. Arthur’s other hand wrapping, light, around his throat, one thumb sliding under his necktie and pressing at the soft of his throat-- that pushed him over.

Spilled over their hands, mind blessedly blank and body wrung clean.

He took a moment to do as Arthur had said: breathe. Just breathe. Collapsed boneless against Arthur's chest, his head laid on Arthur's broad shoulder. Let his eyes drift closed, reality and all its concerns a hundred miles away for once in his longer-than-expected life. Enjoyed the feeling of Arthur fiddling with his necktie and smoothing down his sweat-drenched, still-heaving chest, his touch light and gentle and, if John didn't second-guess himself, adoring. He had to look a mess, but Arthur, apparently, was just fine with that. Appreciative, even, given the hard line still shoved against his ass. Experimentally, just because he could, he shifted his weight left and right. Arthur huffed in his ear, dipped his hands along John's thighs, dragged his nails down the soft skin inside. 

John shifted again. 

Those hands drew back and tightened on his hips. Rasped, "Ain't you had enough?" against his ear-- then dragged him back, pressed him close and ground his hips, harsh, against John’s.

In truth, in that moment, he hadn’t and couldn’t imagine having enough. Regardless of him, Arthur definitely — and very, very clearly — hadn’t. 

"Thought you wanted me dead," John said, apropos of nothing. Rather, apropos of his fading high, and the way Arthur swallowed a groan against his ear when he started rutting and John encouraged it, matching his pace with hissed breath and shaky sighs.

"At the time," throaty and husky, sending a kinder fire straight to his spent cock, "and sometimes still, sure," his hands dropping back to John's thighs and spreading them wide, which put some embarrassed red on the back of John's neck when he looked up to see Abigail watching. Except her gaze was appreciative, not demeaning, and -- in the end, the real embarrassment was over how being put on display rekindled the heat below his stomach.

John couldn't help a grin at that, though it was weak and not so friendly. "What change your mind?"

"You're a jackass, John," Arthur cupped his balls and thumbed the crown of his cock; made him hiss as his grip went a little mean on the over-sensitive area, his mind liking what his body wasn't ready to do again just yet, "but you came back. Been told that counts for something." 

"Wouldn't have this without him," Abigail said, meaning-- plenty, John was sure. Plenty. Hopefully.

Arthur hummed. Dragged John farther back again, sat him on his lap. The part of John that had started and wouldn't stop wanting _wanted_ ever fiercer, though he knew it wouldn't be pleasant without... Preparation? Was that how it went? He wouldn't know. Arthur took them both in hand, though he was dried up and the sensation was near too much; meant he could fit them in one hand, though, which sure made a pretty picture. So pretty John tilted his head forward to watch, cheeks and chest hot from more than exertion.

"You're hard to hate for long," Arthur continued, words low and full with an emotion they wouldn't dare name aloud lest it become too big and drive them apart, "unfortunately." 

"Oh, yeah, real unfortunate," John drawled, head tilted back again. 

And breathed. Just breathed.

Arthur set up a slow, rolling rhythm, which seemed like insanity to John. He kept his legs wide and tried to keep up, but exhaustion pulled heavy at his limbs. Left Arthur doing most of the work, but-- still got a groan when John lifted his arms over his head and set them on Arthur's back, arching his back and bearing down on him. Got a growl and a sloppy kiss at the corner of his mouth a second later, Arthur's hand taking up a faster pace. Started to hurt, that much that quick, in a fashion so close to pleasure John knew he'd be playing the scene over in his head later. Found himself thinking he'd look forward to getting more such scenes to replay, but first, they needed to finish this one.

Didn't take too long. The grip rough, tight, Arthur fucking hard against John. Made John writhe again, forced him to bite his lip to keep from yelling, his whole body confused on what it wanted to do. Rather, it knew exactly what it wanted to do, but it couldn't, and-- he breathed out, moaned, swore, bit out a, _hurry up, you bastard,_ and then found himself abruptly on his hands and knees, Arthur a huge weight along his back. Got his thighs pushed closed and held there, Arthur fucking in the left-over slick between them.

Arthur had a hand at the back of his neck, shoving his face into the bed. Made him feel dirty, like that; a fucked-out whore, ass up and being used. Except what came out of his mouth wasn't grit teeth and platitudes but honest praise, a repetitive _yeah, come on, Morgan, take it already. You want me, don't you?_

Seemed he did, as that had him cumming. Pulling back to spill over John's back, a heat that rapidly cooled and would undoubtedly leave a sticky mess. John shuddered with it; above him, Arthur cursed, a bitten-off four-letter word, low and fond and indescribably pleased.

"Don't move," he said, backing off from John (making him shudder again, the room's chill scalding where Arthur and Abigail's heat had filled), "you'll make a mess."

John looked over his shoulder, cheek still pressed against the bed. Kept his pose when he saw how Arthur's eyes feasted on him, his face flushed and expression soft in a way John hadn't ever seen directed at him. Seeing the look stole his breath; made him clear his throat to get his words working again. He did, eventually, at a _you better fuck me again_ rasp that surprised him. "And whose fault is that?"

Arthur's lips quirked up. Tore his eyes off his handiwork to give John a real smile, then, half satisfaction and half appreciation.

Stuck in afterglow, Arthur didn’t look a thing like the Pinkerton Agent who’d dragged him out of Gaptooth Ridge. Didn’t much look like he had what it systemically disassemble a notorious gang from the inside, either, or a man ready to kill him for leaving his wife and child alone for two months. He was, though; he was all those things, some how and some way. Same as John was slated to become a rancher, and a decent husband and father. Didn’t make much sense. 

However it worked out, he supposed it would. They’d make it work. Always did.

A rag hit him in the head.

From Abigail, who'd thrown it, “Quite the show, boys. Arthur Morgan, you’ve done me a great service.”

“Feeling’s mutual,” Arthur replied, taking the rag from John before he could embarrass himself trying to wipe his back. He cleaned John off gently, keeping him still with a light hand on his hips (over where there were bound to be red marks, if not bruises).

“Will you sleep here?” 

Abigail asked that, because without the haze of afterglow and sex to steal away the awkwardness and deny it though he might, said awkwardness would never let John ask the man whose cock he'd all but hopped on to stick around. By how Arthur blinked at them, John wondered if his brain had even started working well enough to figure out that he needed a place to sleep. Probably not, as it was only when he started answering her question that he started getting up to gather his clothes. The dirtied rag, he passed to Abigail on his way by her.

“I-- no, I can’t. Charles is expecting me back.”

“Sure,” she said, rolling with it smooth as anything, “maybe next time.”

“Next time,” he echoed, blank. Still working through the night's events. John, his own mind still pleasantly fuzzed out, appreciated seeing him struggling to keep up just as much. “Right. Sure.”

Abigail gave him a smile. He didn’t know it, but John did; a smile like that guaranteed a _next time._

“Good. See you at breakfast.”

"Night," John called after him, more quiet.

"Night," Arthur returned. He didn't stop smiling, John noted, even as he took his leave.

 

. . .

 

Creaking floorboards, a door hinge in need of grease and the unmistakable too-quiet silence of someone sneaking into a room while trying very hard not to make noise brought Charles out of his deep sleep. That someone settling down a hand’s width away, slipping under the shared wool blanket with an appreciative noise for its trapped warmth, and, when Charles made a sleep-filled noise that roughly resembled _Arthur, that you?_ , rolling themselves into his side-- _that_ jolted him fully back to the waking world.

“Just me,” said Arthur, who took Charles’ drowsy murmur as an invitation to put his head on Charles’ shoulder and curl an arm across his chest. It was a toss-up whether he meant the words as an answer to Charles’ question or a belated statement of the obvious. In the end, the distinction didn’t matter much.

“You reek,” Charles told him, but got his arm around Arthur’s shoulders and rested his chin on his cool, sweat-damp head all the same. 

Arthur’s arm tightened around him, his leg tangling between Charles’ and a foot hooked around his ankle. A gesture that would’ve been nice except that it Charles jump and Arthur chuckle, bastard that he was.

Charles demanded, much more awake for the ice against his leg: “Why are you freezing?”

“Can’t smoke in the house.” Yes, they could. And did. All the time. Ignoring his own idiocy, Arthur continued innocently, “And it’s cold outside, Charles.”

He shoved Arthur with his shoulder, jostling him off his human-shaped perch and personal heater. Arthur, of course, chuckled again. Then he kindly removed his thawing toes from his calf, which bought him enough good-will for Charles to let him nestle back in.

After an exaggerated sniff-and-groan at his hair, Charles muttered a fondly exasperated, “Go back out and dunk your head.”

“And get hypothermia? S’cruel.”

Living in Beecher’s Hope had made them both soft. Not three months ago, Charles would’ve had a knife in hand by the end of the door’s opening squeak, and Arthur certainly wouldn’t have dared waking him up because he felt like being held. Rest was a precious commodity with somebody needing to keep watch over their two-person camp.

Arthur pressed a chaste kiss along his jawline. Lingered there, taking a moment to just breathe him in. Happy with the calm, Charles’ hand threaded through his short hair. Dropped it to rub gentle circles into the tense muscles at his neck, smiling to himself over Arthur’s quiet, appreciative hum against his throat. If Arthur were any more awake, Charles knew he'd want to play with his longer hair, temporarily unbraided as it was. Good thing he wasn't, as he often left it more a mess than when he started (though he was, slowly, getting better at braiding it _for_ Charles).

Plenty happy to fall asleep that way, Arthur’s breathing slowed soon after that. He nuzzled his face against Charles' neck, his arm again giving his side a squeeze. 

It wasn’t too bad, being soft. 

Before they dropped off, Charles remarked into the night's quiet, “Since you’re so happy, I’m guessing your tryst went well.”

“It went.” Keeping silent, Charles gave him time to work _that_ one out. Eventually, Arthur did, the tension in him bleeding out to a subdued contentment, “Well. Yeah. It went well.” Which, for Arthur, meant he’d enjoyed himself thoroughly and would need about five more days to realize it wouldn’t bite him in the ass at the first opportunity. True to form, Arthur’s next question was a hasty, cautious, _I still don’t believe you’re fine with this and have obviously closed my ears every time you've said you were_ , “You really didn’t hear a thing?”

As Arthur’s off-on distrust of himself was exhausting at best and baffling at worst, Charles didn’t even bother humoring it.

Said, plain and simple, “Heard somebody fall off the bed at some point. Nobody yelled, so I assumed it was planned.”

Easing up on the wariness, Arthur snorted, soft. 

“Hard to plan for Marston.” 

Another light kiss to his jawline. Part apology, maybe; because he could and liked to remind them both he could, probably. He thought about asking for clarification, a bit of him honestly curious about how John could possibly have surprised Arthur when the man wore his heart so on his sleeve. Then he recalled the miracle it was that nobody’d yelled, no guns had been fired, and no houses not-so-accidentally set ablaze. Miracle too that Arthur came back pleased and sated and not bruised or bleeding. Presumably John was in good health, too, as Abigail didn’t have to drive Arthur out for heckling him to death. Yet further miracle that Jack hadn’t been woken or the dogs set to barking. Figured, finally, that Arthur would explain if it was something worth telling. The pause to follow lasted long enough that when Arthur spoke again, Charles’ eyes had drifted shut, his earlier sleepiness returning with a vengeance. 

“Was just him figuring out what he wanted. Turned out fine. They… got a lot of energy.”

Charles quietly scoffed, not opening his eyes. “You calling me boring?” 

“Nothing wrong with boring. Sleeping’s boring, and I like sleep just fine.”

Arthur Morgan, wordsmith, romantic and charmer. 

In response, Charles rubbed his knuckles into Arthur’s hair. Arthur grumbled about the rough treatment and ducked his head, digging his fingers into Charles’ sides where he _knew_ Charles was ticklish, the _bastard._

 

. . .

 

Armadillo’s residents claimed their town suffered a curse. Depending on who was asked, the curse came from an ancient Indian burial ground, a scorned woman turned witch, or God’s own wrath over mankind’s arrogant belief they could settle a town in so desolate and wild a land. Certainly, they struggled through drought and disease aplenty, their hardships many-- the worst of which, according to most, was the tavern owner’s greedy prices for piss-infused beer.

Their newest sheriff had arrived with his wife, three deputies and a U.S. Marshall. By the end of his first month, he was down to one deputy, the other two buried six feet down and the U.S. Marshall being driven out of town on account of gross misconduct with the sheriff’s wife. The wife left soon after that, too, citing the sheriff’s bad breath from drinking too much piss-infused beer.

All that, Arthur learned within thirty minutes of meeting the general store manager and in helping him load up the Marston’s wagon with their monthly groceries. If the citizens of Armadillo were cursed, he thought, it was the curse of being loose-lipped gossips, and they deserved all misery that came their way because of it. 

By the time the groceries were loaded up, Arthur had tuned the manager out and gave him only the barest positive-sounding responses. Soon as was polite, he climbed back to the wagon’s seat with a, “Thank you kindly for your help, mister. I appreciate it,” and didn’t have to fake his sincerity, as he indeed itched to get out of the tiny spit of a town. Rachel - the first of John’s wrangled horses for his horse wrangling business, which after six months in operation boasted a grand total of _five_ horses - stamped her hoof and tossed her head when he grabbed her reins. She was as excited to get out of the shithole town as he was, apparently.

“I don’t believe it. Is the heat playing tricks, or is that Arthur Morgan standing before me?”

Or Rachel tossed her head and stamped her hoof because of the massive, brindled strawberry Shire that trotted out of the alley and stopped _far_ too close to her.

Arthur scowled at its rider for as long as it took him to recognize her. 

So, a second. Roughly. Less, even.

“Long time no see, Mrs. Adler,” he greeted, straightening up. Didn’t relax, exactly; _Arthur Frank_ was wanted alive for a bounty for sixty dollars in Lemoyne, and while that wasn’t something he thought Sadie would travel counties for, he hadn’t seen her long enough to not feel too sure. 

The bounty came from a restless month wherein Charles got it in his head he could make easy money boxing in Saint Denis while Arthur acted like his manager. They had pulled a big enough profit and stir that a certain Mr. Bronte decided he’d wanted a cut, which they’d vehemently disagreed with. One thing led to another, a few shots were fired, a man drowned, and they’d thereafter hightailed it back to the ranch before Bronte convinced the law to act as judge, jury and executioner in one of Saint Denis’ many alleyways. Marston got to strut around with his _I told you Saint Denis is horseshit_ , which Arthur had put up with for all of an afternoon before shoving him against a wall and giving him a _real_ reminder of what he’d missed for the three weeks they’d been gone. 

Sadie gave him a toothy grin, her eyes hard. As he remembered the look even back when she’d first became a bounty hunter after the Pinkertons unequivocally refused to hire a woman, he didn’t think she meant anything by it. 

“ _I’d_ say. Where’ve you been, Morgan?”

“Oh, you know. Around.” He adjusted his hat, glad the thing finally started feeling as worn-rimmed as his old one. “You looking for me, or is this a happy coincidence?”

“Bit of both. Was looking for Marston, actually.” Still in the way, she leaned forward on her saddlehorn in a _I’m getting comfortable_ way that he was sure was meant to piss him off. He didn’t wonder if she could turn off her hunter tendencies anymore; the answer was clearly no. “He put his real name on a mortgage in Blackwater. But then, judging by your wagon full of household goods and you looking like you’ve finally acquaintanced yourself with soap, I’m guessing you knew that.”

Sure did. As two could play at the annoying game, Arthur leaned himself back, too. His getting comfortable made her eyes lose their aggressive edge. So she probably, _actually_ didn’t mean harm. Good to know.

He said, “He wouldn’t mind seeing you if you’re not looking for trouble.”

“He still with Abigail and the boy?”

“He is.”

“You still running with Charles?”

“I am.”

“And now you’re both with them?”

“They helped me out when I was laid up pretty bad. We’re repaying the favor.”

For nigh on a year, without an end in sight. She didn’t need to know that. Most days, Arthur hid it from himself. Kept his doubt low as it could be over what the hell they were doing pretending the law couldn’t find them and burn the house down. Abigail helped in that, too; unsurprisingly, she’d proven most suited for living life in a fixed location. Only stipulations were that they tell her when they were heading out, that they were never followed on their way back, and to mail if they were gone longer than they’d thought. 

Even John could do that. At first he’d resisted, not leaving the ranch’s well-worn routine for _anything_. Watched Charles and Arthur do it a few times: them, leaving for a hunting trip for a week and coming back with money from a too-loud black market operation in Strawberry. Got agitated over that, grouchy and cagey with cabin fever. Got worse when they did it again, except with tales of digging up treasure. Got worse still until Arthur had packed a bag for him and all but threw him onto his horse, threatening that he’d smother him in his sleep if he didn’t quit climbing the walls and heckling Abigail when she _said_ he could _go_.

Perk to having four folk handy with guns around a ranch that wasn’t too busy, he’d told John, was that they could afford to take off once in a while. He’d best just make sure to follow the rules and come back.

Like Abigail thought, he always did. 

Sadie gave Arthur a strange look.

“You all… just ranching?” _That_ , with some humor. Disbelief, too. Maybe a little wistfulness. 

A lot, in other words. None of which he felt right prying at in the middle of town.

“Trying,” he looked pointedly at her horse then, “if folk would get out of the way.”

She snorted. “Alright, alright. Unbunch your knickers, Morgan.”

Nudged her horse forward, out of his way. Turned it around to trot beside his wagon once he got going, which he’d figured she would. 

“What d’you want Marston for, anyway?” He asked as they reached the outside of Armadillo’s main drag. “He kick a hornet nest somewhere we don’t know about?”

“If he has, he’s kept it under wraps from any lawmen. No, I’ve got news I imagine he’d find interesting.” A small pause. She glanced at him, side-long. “Works out nice you’re here, actually.”

“That right?”

“I was going to him because I figured he or Abigail’d have an idea where you were.” She shrugged. “Thought I’d give you a head’s up, since word was you’d dropped out of the Pinkerton life for good and so might not’ve heard. Seeing you acting as errand boy’s just confirmed that.”

“I got a feeling I’m not going to like your news.”

“Said it was interesting, not that it was nice.”

“Could cut out the middleman and just tell me now.”

“I guess.” Even in mid-morning, they were alone on the road. Not many came and went through Armadillo. It was one of the town’s few charms, and why they made the trek despite Blackwater being so much closer. 

She said, stopping his heart, “News is, Dutch van der Linde’s been broken out of his penitentiary.”

He looked to her, sharp. She met and held his gaze. 

He said, “Thought Cornwall’d lynched him.”

That’d been the plan. The _ideal,_ he’d been told. Bring in Dutch alive. Let Cornwall’s men deal with him. Pretend it wasn’t nothing but another job. Bury the gang’s sins, and maybe fall asleep some nights without the guilt.

“That was what Cornwall said. Turns out he’d roughed him up, then sent him packing to the law in exchange for turning a blind eye to some corrupt deal. Lucky for Dutch. Everybody knew the Pinkertons did him in, so nobody thought much of some idiots saying they’d transported Dutch van der Linde. Why the law took so long after that, I can only imagine has to do with that charm of his.”

Rare was a man that heavily guarded and able to break himself out. If anybody could, it’d be Dutch, but more likely was he’d picked up more sorry souls. 

Mouth numb, he asked, “He got a gang?”

“No.” She frowned. “Maybe. _I_ don’t think so. Truth is, there’s so many stories surrounding him, about him being on the run and him being dead, it’s impossible to be sure. Some folk are even saying he’s hiding out with Indians. Specifically the Wapiti up north.”

Arthur sat, quiet. Focused on the path in front of him. Kept Rachel moving.

Finally, he said, “That is interesting news.” Then, a bit sarcastic, “Thanks for sharing.”

“If he _is_ out there, can’t imagine he’s too keen on you.”

“ _Thanks,_ ” he repeated, with more sarcasm.

“No trouble,” she chirped-- then, just as quick, sobered up. Went somber. Said, “If you’re really hanging around the Marston’s ranch…”

Didn’t finish. Didn’t need to. 

Far as Dutch saw it, Abigail might’ve knocked him out, but Arthur’d taken his family apart. Far as Arthur saw it, the truth wasn’t far off in the least. With revenge on the table-- and oh, it’d be on the table-, would only be fitting and fair for Dutch to dismantle Arthur’s newfound family right back.

Sadie and he rode in silence a while after that. Up to MacFarlane’s. 

A little past that, she split off for Thieves’ Landing, saying she had a bounty to pick up. What she’d told Arthur was all she knew for sure; if she heard anything more, she’d share, but she had her own trouble to contend with. He told her he’d pass on the news, and that she should stop by the ranch sometime to say hello. That she didn’t have to stay. She gave him a _maybe_ , wished him luck, and galloped off.

He returned to the ranch. Swept Jack up in a hug when he ran out, the boy excited to show him a tiny, blue, absolutely magnificent fish he’d caught by the river with Charles. Helped Abigail unload the groceries. Packed himself a small bag, fast and light and perfect for the road. Put it and his saddle not on Buell but on one of their spare horses, a blue roan Nokota that John had won out of a poker game. Ignored Charles’ too-knowing looks when he spent a solid five minutes giving Copper, who had more than a touch of grey on his muzzle, an ear-scratch.

Went back to the house when Abigail rang the supper bell. Ate lunch with them all.

Time went quick. Too quick. 

Abigail gave him curious looks. Frowned when he failed to rise to John’s teasing. 

As Abigail instructed Jack on how to store the remaining stew and the rest of them got up to attend to a fence broken for the past week, Charles asked, “Something happen in Armadillo, Arthur?”

“No,” he said, after a pause, stopping, “nothing important. But I do think… I need to go away for a while.”

“Sounds important if it’s dragging you off.” John, frowning at him. Charles didn’t look too pleased either. Both stopped walking, turning to him.

“Might take a while,” he continued, ignoring how it spiked John’s irritation. “Two weeks at the least. I’ll mail if it’s longer.”

Charles stepped toward him. Too close. Arthur resisted the urge to push him back. “We can go with you.”

“I’ve got to handle it alone,” he said. 

Charles hesitated, clearly caught between arguing and letting him be-- but, good as he was, he left off when he saw the look in Arthur’s eyes.

John was not as easily swayed. “Hold on. You’re being clear as mud.”

“Tell Abigail I’m sorry I missed saying good-bye, but I need to go.” 

“Arthur,” John said, less a growl and more concerned, “ _what_ happened, exactly?”

“It can’t be so time sensitive,” Charles added, quietly, “that you can’t even say good-bye.”

Thing was, if all three of them asked him why, he wasn’t sure he’d keep his mouth shut. He wasn’t entirely sure his plan, except that it couldn’t involve them. 

He said, “If Jack asks, I’m hunting bear,” and left, before they could stop him. At his back, he heard Charles stop John from following; heard John yell after him to fess up; heard, thankfully, no sound of Abigail coming out to the porch and seeing what was happening. Head stuffed with silence, he saddled up and rode out, quick as possible.

When Copper made to follow him, thinking he was going on a hunting trip, he told him to stop and head home. The dog stared at him in uncertainty, head cocked and tail frozen from its happy wagging. It took a harsh _stay_ to get him to listen, his tail tucked as he sat and did as bid. He thought about tying him to a post, but he already felt his resolve at leaving weakening. He couldn’t wait around any longer.

So he left Copper like that, too, staring after him.

 

. . .

 

Turned out Sadie’s news was true, and moreover, that his ability to hone in on Dutch wasn’t as rusty as he’d thought. Like any skill ingrained and then left to collect dust (like any son left to wander and then return), it took only a few short, cold leads before he happened on a fresh trail. The tip-off came just shy of two weeks into his journey north, from a disgraced Army Captain by the name of Monroe. Said he’d been helping the Wapiti on the low until he’d been accused of treason by a cowardly commander. Would’ve been killed straight-up if not for Eagles Flies, the chief’s son, and a white man he’d never seen in the area before swooping in and busting him out. 

The price of his walking free was his career and an escalation in the tensions between the Army and Wapiti. Arthur didn’t care much about the ruined state of his pristine career, but he did care about the description of the mysterious white man.

“He was a chatty fellow,” Monroe said, “though the more I listened, the less he seemed to say much of anything. He was keen on firing up Eagle Flies for a fight his people couldn’t afford.”

Monroe couldn’t recall his name. Might’ve gotten it, he said, but he’d been a little distracted with escaping and figuring out what he would do next.

So Arthur asked, “He ride a white horse?”

“Yes, he did. How’d you know that? Do you know him?”

“Might say that.”

 

. . .

 

That evening, Arthur sent post to his family. Wrote that he was sorry for leaving on such short notice. That he appreciated the home they’d made in that once-hopeless plot of land. That word was Dutch was back, and he needed to make sure they weren’t caught in what grudge the man had. 

That if they didn’t hear from him in a week, to assume Dutch and he had settled their dispute.

 

. . .

 

At the Wapiti reservation, after making it clear he wasn’t there for any of their people, he met Rains Fall. He was told that, yes, Dutch had been there, and that he’d left the day prior. 

“You’re the second to ask after him,” he told Arthur. “The first made him pack up and leave.”

Arthur frowned. “Any idea who that was?”

“Mr. van der Linde called him a friend. Once he showed up, neither tarried long. They went east.”

Arthur thanked him for the information, and to the obvious relief of everyone else at the camp, kept going.

 

. . .

 

By a campfire set atop warm red stone overlooking a wild, untouched pool, the air chill and crisp and undisturbed save a raven’s call as the sun set low on the horizon, Arthur found Dutch. 

He looked a wreck.

Not at first glance. At first glance, his clothing was of fine make, a smart, red, vest-and-plush-leather jacket ensemble lined in black satin. His hair was tastefully askew, salt and pepper rather than jet black. His hairline had receded some, but that was simply the way of getting older. A colorful woven blanket was draped over his shoulders, his dual pistols still strapped to his hips. He sat on a rock by the fire, a mug of dark, steaming liquid in hand.

At first glance, he was a gentleman enjoying a bit of camping. The tent was plain and the supplies meager, but he held himself with confidence. Seeing him sent Arthur back to when he was fifteen, sixteen, eighteen, nineteen-- and then later, through the bars of a prison wagon, watching him stride through _his_ camp like a king.

Eyes alighting with a dangerous gleam, he greeted Arthur with a smile that shattered the picture his demeanor painted.

On second glance, his hair wasn’t tastefully askew. It was an uncombed, thinning mess. His moustache wasn’t just long, but dirty and unwashed. His clothing, though of decent make, hadn’t been properly cared for; his shirt was untucked on one side under the vest, and dirt and mud colored his pants. Blood had crusted under his nails.

“Arthur!” He motioned Arthur, who’d dismounted in silence not far from the cliff or camp edge, closer. “I knew you’d show up the moment I started feeling comfortable. That’s the one thing you’ve proven reliable for.”

“Figured I’d save you the trouble of finding me.”

“Did I say I was looking for you?” Dutch scoffed. Shook his head. “Presumptuous. That was your problem, boy. Not everything revolves around you.”

“That was _my_ problem, huh?” Arthur muttered, stepping into the firelight. 

Dutch’s eyes narrowed, his smile dropping. Then they flicked over Arthur’s shoulder, to his lone horse and beyond, across the treeline. 

“Where’s your friends, boy? I expected you to be a Marshall by now. Slaving away for old Uncle Sam. Imagine he’d be the only one who’d take you after even the rich grew tired of how you slithered.”

Arthur thought about reaching for his pistol. Although he knew it meant nothing with how fast a draw Dutch’d been, he kept his hands well above his waist. One with the mug, the other on his knee. For the moment, he seemed happy to chew Arthur out in word. By how still he held himself, his disgust and disdain palpable, Arthur couldn’t guess how long that’d last. Against his better judgment, he kept his hands above his waist, too. Could’ve finished it all by taking Dutch out from across the lake -- he had his scoped rifle. It wouldn’t have been difficult. And yet, the thought hadn’t even crossed his mind until he stood squarely in the other’s sights.

Wondered for a moment if he even could shoot Dutch. Would’ve been easier two years previous, too. Didn’t even have to be a bullet in the head. All those years ago, Dutch’d taught him how to cripple a man without letting him bleed out. 

(But could he aim the gun and pull the trigger?)

Because it wasn’t a question he could answer even to himself (and that was answer enough), he said, “Just here for and by myself, Dutch.”

“Is that right? Just… a courtesy call?”

“No. Not really. Been working for myself for a while now.” The truth. Relatively. 

“Little late for that to matter for me, son.”

There it was. A curled lip. The dangerous gleam in his eye.

And his hand, drawing his pistol.

Arthur drew his a second after. 

“Excuse me!”

No shot rang out. The click of a hammer, yes; the rattle of metal being drawn, yes; but a pulled trigger and its consequence, no. The call interrupted Dutch’s focus. Arthur saw the hesitation a second before he pulled the trigger. A second earlier on his part, and he would’ve had an answer on if he could’ve shot who had once been his better father figure. But he hadn’t been a second earlier, and Dutch hesitated, and their peacemaker revealed himself a moment later, a rifle slung across his back and breath shortened from, presumably, running.

“Oh, good. Arthur.” Hosea did not sound like Arthur was just the man he wanted to see, but he gave him a thin smile all the same as he walked himself to Dutch’s side. “Hello again. Pardon my yelling. I know neither of you were causing trouble or spilling blood on this gorgeous land, but I needed to make sure.”

Dutch didn’t look away from Arthur. “Does him holding a gun to my head look like friendly behavior to you, Hosea?”

“Why, I imagine he’s being as friendly as you, Dutch. You sour old coot.”

Dutch bristled, glancing sharp at his long-time traveling companion. The gun in his hand didn’t waver. Despite that, Arthur saw the distraction and plea for what it was; and, after a moment, discovering his answer -- _no, he couldn’t shoot him, no matter where_ \-- he lowered his gun back to his side. Didn’t reholster it, because he wasn’t that sentimental or stupid, no matter all signs to the contrary. Hosea nodded appreciatively to him, saying, “Thank you, Arthur, for being civilized,” which inspired a feeling Arthur didn’t fancy lingering over.

Dutch, noting the exchange, scowled. Then, in a clear struggle with himself, lightened his expression and his mood, lowering his pistol to his lap.

“You always spoiled the boys,” Dutch chided Hosea. “Arthur the worst of all. Some things never change.”

Hosea breathed an airy, unamused laugh. He continued to breathe hard, Arthur noticed, as he sat heavily on a fallen tree, his back bowing and hands planted on his knees. 

“Went hunting,” he informed them both, the words choked up by a cough, “but guess I scared off the prey. No, keep that foul stuff away from me. Don’t care what good the chief claims it does, it goes down smooth as cow shit.”

Hosea waved away the mug Dutch offered, before covering his mouth with his hand as his cough became a fit. It took a moment to figure out why Arthur’s chest felt tight just listening to Hosea, but he realized eventually: the sound inspired fear. That wasn’t a cough folk recovered from, older folk least of all. By how Dutch forced the mug into his hands - not cider, as Arthur had assumed, but a medicine - the moment Hosea stopped shaking long enough to hold it, Arthur figured Dutch knew his time were short. Figured it more as Dutch’s attention fled entirely from Arthur and fixated firmly on Hosea, his face torn up with obvious concern. 

Ignoring the look, Hosea focused on the mug and steadying his hand’s tremor. His efforts were in vain, as its liquid threatened to splash over the rim all the same. Hosea took a sip and grimaced, the fire’s light deepening the lines in his face. It’d been too dark to see before, but he saw in the firelight how sharp Hosea’s cheekbones had grown. How sunken in and purpled the bags beneath his eyes looked. 

“I went to all the trouble befriending that boy’s irritable father… Started fighting the Army, rescued a goddamned career Captain... All for you, Hosea. And now, you won’t even take what I got out of it.”

“Didn’t ask you to do any of it, Dutch. You involved yourself on your own accord. Now we got to get lost all over again.”

“As if we’d settled anywhere to begin with.” Dutch shook his head again. “This tent isn’t what I’d call the lap of luxury.”

“Weren’t being driven out, which I consider good enough.”

Despite the complaints, Hosea drank more from the mug. The tremor in his hand calmed, his lungs following suit slowly and with much wet-sounding, wheezing protest. 

Then, and only then, did Dutch look back to Arthur. He’d almost thought Dutch forgot him, but it became crystal clear he hadn’t by his glower.

“Come to gloat?” He shook his head, his glower disappearing into a look of pure exhaustion. “No graves just yet for you to dance on, I’m afraid. Give it a few months.”

“Weren’t that,” Arthur said, a mumble. 

He struggled hard not to turn back into the kid he’d been, looking for answers from two people who seemed to understand the whole world. Seeing Hosea so sick hadn’t been something he’d ever wanted. Seeing Dutch care so much despite the deranged distraction lurking in his every move didn’t satisfy, either. He knew then Dutch hadn’t gotten out of prison on his power alone, but neither was he charming anybody into following him any longer. If he was doing anything, it wasn’t anything he’d fully thought out. The Dutch in front of him, hollowed out, didn’t seem capable of master plans or clever schemes for revenge.

The last of the van der Linde gang, washed up. The times had left them behind, just as Arthur had known. Took til then for him to realize he hadn’t understood what such an end meant. Because he’d adapted, despite him thinking he hadn’t. Life had managed to grow him roots well as it could. With John, Abigail, Jack. Charles. The ranch. Although Hosea and Dutch clung to life, to _the_ life, they were wanted nowhere but with each other. They’d die as they lived.

It was possible they wanted that. Equally possible it was just the only way they could go.

Arthur didn’t know. But he knew then, looking at them, that he had a place to go.

(A bit of him begged to take them with. It was the young, foolish part of him, the one that never really gave up on family. The one he’d thought had died when Dutch shoved a gun to his head.)

“Nice as it is to see you alive and well, Arthur,” Hosea said after a beat of silence, over the lip of his mug, “I think it may be best you take your leave. I don’t believe you belong here anymore.”

“Quite,” Dutch echoed, stiff.

If it weren’t for Hosea’s presence, Arthur was sure he’d have shot Arthur’s head clean off. That wasn’t alright, but it was what was deserved.

They didn’t want to hear about their former gang. The ones who’d ran and never looked back, whether or not they said they would. Maybe Hosea was in touch with Susan; maybe Dutch’s clothes were a result of mailed money; maybe Javier had invited them to run with Sean and Karen’s crew. Probably, they didn’t have a clue about any of them, as it invited old, deep wounds to reopen and bleed out what life they had left.

Whatever the reason, Arthur wouldn’t dispute it. He'd ruined enough of their plans.

He said, “It was good seeing you,” and meant it. 

Hosea gave him a tight smile. Dutch didn’t even blink.

In the fading light of a dusk near gone, Arthur got back on his horse, turned south, and went home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and that's... a wrap!
> 
> major and forever thanks to everyone who's commented, tweeted, and given feedback about this fic throughout its posting. <3 I'm really thankful you all gave this shamelessly fix-it AU a chance! wouldn't have been near as fun to write without such a great fandom. 
> 
> as always, find me on [tumblr](https://unkingly.tumblr.com/) at unkingly or [twitter](https://twitter.com/exkingly) at exkingly. :) til next time, space cowboys. . .


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